


We Are Go (Go Go Go)

by whenyoudesertme (phrenk)



Category: Arashi (Band), Japanese Actor RPF, Johnny's Entertainment
Genre: Alternate Universe, Camping, Fake/Pretend Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-20
Updated: 2015-06-20
Packaged: 2018-04-09 02:50:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 21,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4330947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phrenk/pseuds/whenyoudesertme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nino has been in love with Aiba forever.  He knows he should decline when Aiba asks him to pretend to be his boyfriend for a trip with friends, but when has Nino ever been able to resist Aiba?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [yumenosete](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yumenosete/gifts).



> Thank you to my beta, kinoface, for being helpful and wonderful and the best, and thank you to nino_mod for her endless patience and encouragement. For yumenosete in ninoexchange 2015. ♥ Originally posted [here](http://ninoexchange.livejournal.com/51509.html); re-posted as myself [here](http://whenyoudesertme.livejournal.com/39900.html).

===

Nino wasn't a dramatic person, even when it came to embarrassingly long-term, embarrassingly life-altering unrequited love, but it was becoming clear that each visit to Aiba's place was a step toward another goodbye.

He'd fought against the realization, shoving his feelings down with the ruthlessness of experience, but he knew now that he'd come back too soon. It wasn't the sort of self-indulgence he usually allowed himself, but he couldn't help thinking it was unfair: he had only been back for a couple of months, had barely gotten his place the way he liked it, and his job's new incarnation was only starting to make sense.

This soon, and his defenses were already crumbling.

He stopped in the convenience store nearest Aiba's place to buy beer, then changed his mind and left empty-handed. He'd waited years to come back, had convinced himself he had it under complete control, but for as self-aware a person as Nino was, he'd managed to lie to himself this time. He'd come back because he couldn't stay away from Aiba any longer, that was all.

And nothing changed, not in five years, ten, not now as they were nearing twenty. The teenage Aiba's gangly form might have gained muscle and grace, and the reckless behavior of Aiba's college years might have settled into a steady if greatly enthusiastic mode of life... even the brightly-burning Aiba of five years ago, right before Nino had left their apartment and his old life, had been at times painfully uncertain of himself. The present Aiba, the man he was walking to meet, had grown into someone more self-assured than Nino had been at all prepared for.

These differences didn't change anything when it came to the incontrovertible fact that Aiba was the love of Nino's life, the partner in just about every relationship fantasy he'd had since he was thirteen. He was also, always and most importantly, Nino's best friend.

Nino changed his mind and went back and bought the beer. It would make him feel exposed, overly intimate, to show up at Aiba's place without anything to offer, even though he had no intention of drinking.

Having walked as slowly as his traitor of a heart would allow, and stopping halfway to send a few texts to stall further, he let himself into Aiba's building with his spare key. Aiba had given it to him the first time they'd seen each other back in Tokyo, one sign of many that Aiba had been waiting for Nino to come back. Opening the door to Aiba's apartment, Nino steeled himself for the indescribable jolt that seeing his best friend always was.

He made it to the kitchen without being apprehended and set the beer on the counter just in time to be lifted into the air by a hug.

"A little warning might be nice," he crabbed, heart soaring irresponsibly at the affectionate grip of Aiba's strong arms, but Aiba only laughed and twirled him one more time before setting him carefully on a stool.

"Good call bringing drinks, Nino!" Aiba said, looking at him with that same blindingly beloved face as always. "Today we're going to make a plan that will improve the lives of two people forever. Makes sense to toast after, right?"

Nino stared at that tanned, hopeful face, then sighed with defeated amusement. "Speak on, Aiba-san, since there's clearly no stopping you."

Aiba grinned at him and charged right into it.

===

"I'm sorry, after your endless torrent of words, I fear my ears must be malfunctioning. If you had to sum your no doubt foolproof plan all up in three words, I think that's all the room I have left."

Aiba, still recovering, had to ponder for a few seconds. He held up his hand. "Can we make it five?"

Nino looked away from those long fingers and heaved a breath. "To do so, I'd have to delete that whole sidebar about the way you researched by watching animals at the zoo, and I have to say, that might not be any kind of loss. You did seem to feel it merited a few thousand words--"

"Fine, you awful jerk, delete it and listen up," Aiba laughed, slapping Nino's shoulder to show his offended feelings.

Nino nodded and made a face more suited to hearing about the fate of the universe than Aiba's summing up of an obviously harebrained scheme.

Aiba said with cheerful grandeur, "Please be my fake boyfriend, Nino!"

Sighing, Nino put his head in his hands. "Six. All you had to do was leave off the name, which you didn't need, and instead--that is, of course, leaving aside the whole thing of why would we _ever_ pretend to be boyfriends, and no, before you try again, I'm not accepting your observations on elephant behavior as a reason."

He had, of course, actually been listening, and it wasn't really that complicated despite the way Aiba's excited mind sprinted off in all directions. It was utterly ridiculous, however, and unnecessary and unhelpful to every single person involved, especially himself.

Aiba wanted them to pretend to be a couple while on a trip with another couple, two men who had been together for a while but were hugely awkward and apparently incapable of even basic physical intimacy. He'd gone on another long tangent when it came to how he knew them, which had included casual, heartrending references to how lonely he'd been when Nino had left, and it seemed that they'd really helped him out in the past.

He felt indebted. He cared deeply about them in that openhearted Aiba way of his. And he thought that if he could just show them an example of a gay couple who had easy intimacy and an obviously close relationship, it might help them to open up to each other.

Nino let Aiba re-hash the idea in a nervous babble a while longer before he interrupted, "And what does this all have to do with me?"

Aiba looked startled. "You're my best friend? And we have good skinship already, plus you're gay, so--"

"So being pawed by some random guy is my idea of fun?" Nino said, trying to look affronted.

"Some random guy!?" Aiba protested, then read Nino's expression correctly and whined, "Quit teasing me and just say yes already, okay?"

Wishing he had the self-control to decline this ludicrous scheme and knowing he was going to let himself be persuaded, Nino said calmly, "Tell me three reasons why I should."

So promptly that Nino knew he'd been saving them up for just this moment, Aiba said, "One, you love me. Two, you don't have any plans this weekend. Three, food and lodging and entertainment will be provided... free of charge."

The very fact that he was going to agree to pretend to be in love with the person he'd secretly loved for well over a decade was a giant, flashing neon sign that he was going to have to separate himself from this situation. He had to do it, and soon, before he lost all control and risked his place in Aiba's life. Again.

He made grumbling noises that had Aiba gesticulating wildly as he described the good this experiment would do for Nino's soul, the intangible benefit of helping out two people who desperately needed it, who loved each other but couldn't show it.

Easy intimacy. An obviously close relationship.

It'd be torture, the worst kind and the best. It'd show him, definitively, that he had to leave, while giving him something to remember while he was gone.

"--and all we'll need to do is be ourselves, just with some extra touching, a lot of hand-holding, and one really good kiss!" Aiba concluded, then hastily grabbed Nino's shoulders and said, "Did I mention the free food?"

_And one really good kiss._

Nino closed his eyes as he felt his love for Aiba with all his heart, then opened them with it hidden away again.

"Fine."

"But don't you see, they need us to--huh? For real? Oh yay, yay, Nino, thank you--"

Nino knocked Aiba's arms away when they seemed about to pick him up or hug him or twirl him again. "But I'm not helping with anything."

"You're going to have to help with the touching, you know," Aiba said, frowning as he settled back on his stool. "And the backstory, but I figure it'll be more fun if we make that up as we go along, knowing you? Like a prank _and_ a game," he finished triumphantly. "I should've said that earlier!"

"Now my every last qualm is defeated," Nino said dryly. "I understand all of that, but I'm not helping otherwise."

Aiba moved a little closer. "But you did hear what I said about one really good kiss?"

"I'm not talking about kissing," Nino snapped, hoping his cheeks didn't look as red as they felt. "I'm saying the planning, the preparation, all that stuff. That's on you."

"I will plan _everything_ ," Aiba said, eyes shining in a way that wasn't to be trusted.

"Oh, that reminds me," Nino said pleasantly. "Listen carefully, Aiba-chan. If your plan is something I know _you_ know I would have rejected, I'm out."

"But--"

"You have known me long enough to know what I like," Nino said with finality.

Aiba nodded, looking thoughtful, then visibly remembered to sulk at Nino's strict rules. Nino, as unwillingly fascinated by that face as ever, noted the excited amusement still lurking in the deep crinkles around his eyes. He had to turn a fond smile into a put-upon scowl, but it came almost as naturally.

"I'll be good," Aiba promised.

Nino had to shut his eyes against his gut twinging in appalling happiness at the idea of this person, so dear, so off-limits, being good to him that way. It's not like he didn't know this whole idea was awful, but it was rude of it to be so clearly a disaster before they even started. He opened his eyes to find Aiba watching him intently.

Before he could read that expression, Nino was receiving the full force of Aiba's beaming smile. "In fact, I'll be the best boyfriend you ever had!"

Nino distracted himself from those smile lines and warm eyes by beginning a list of his regrets.

===

Despite knowing those initial regrets would only grow as time passed, Nino hadn't expected them to multiply exponentially quite so quickly.

One look at their mode of transportation brought the full force of his agreement home to him. The risk to his heart, sure, it was terrible, but it was a known quantity. He'd risked his heart every day since meeting Aiba by refusing to stop being his friend, even if the last five years had been long-distance.

He should have been worried about more tangible things, because it seemed that when he trusted Aiba to plan a weekend for them as fake boyfriends, Aiba thought that meant it should involve a _camper van_.

"No, no, no, it's an RV!" Aiba said, flinging his arms out to show just how huge the difference was. Nino barely dodged an elbow to the face, which didn't improve his mood.

"Do you even know what RV means?" Nino asked. After walking up from the station, they were standing across the parking lot from the meeting place. It was supposed to be a last confirmation of their plan, but Nino couldn't tear his eyes away from the tiny beige death-trap he was to be stuck in for who knew how long. Even worse was what it implied. They were heading into the _wilderness._ He nervously patted the pocket that held his Nintendo 3DS, then the pocket with the car charger.

Aiba, meanwhile, was clearly puzzling over English words that started with R. Then he snapped his fingers and said happily, " _Roomy_."

Nino sighed, "Oh good, the lying starts early. While we're at it, what's the V?"

Question marks practically popped into being all around Aiba's flatteringly mussed hair, but after more seconds than Nino would have allowed him without mockery if it weren't for the constant distraction of their impending fake relationship, he said gleefully, "Vroom!"

"I'm sorry?" Nino asked, pretending not to have heard.

"Roomy vroooooom!" Aiba cried and fist-pumped to himself like he was about to receive a championship trophy for his intellectual skills.

"I feel like our fake breakup is drawing near," Nino muttered, but he couldn't quite keep the laugh out of his voice.

"We are going to be together forever," Aiba retorted cheerfully, seemingly not at all concerned with Nino's cardiovascular health. He dropped an arm around Nino's hunched shoulders and gestured expansively at the RV. "They bought it years ago, but this is the first time I've been invited to come too. It's going to be the best, right?"

"So who are these RV-buying, intimacy-stunted individuals?" Nino said, shrugging away from Aiba mostly because in a few minutes, he'd have to lean closer instead. Since he had to have this experience, he pulled out his phone and took a picture of his temporary home to use as evidence of his mistreatment.

"Nah, Captain's with Gakky," Aiba said cheerfully. "He bought the Super Soul with Sho-chan before he met her."

Nino blinked, then said, "I can see your mouth is moving and I hear sounds, so I assume you're trying to communicate."

"The RV belongs to Captain and Sho-chan." Aiba spoke slowly, as if speed were the problem. "They've been friends for years, and camping buddies, practically an old married couple except they're platonic, you see? Captain's straight, I think, and he's with Gakky, has been for almost six years, I think? And Sho-chan's bi, like me, and he's with--"

"Stop," Nino choked. His vision got blurry as he tried desperately to process Aiba's matter-of-fact coming out. "Aiba-chan, you--"

"Ah, I was so excited that you were home that I forgot to tell you!" Aiba said brightly. "I finally figured out I was bisexual while you were gone, isn't that great? Sho-chan really helped me work it all out, and, um, his boyfriend, too..."

"You. You just--Aiba-chan, you didn't--" Nino had pined for his straight best friend for well over a decade. He hoped it didn't take that long for his tongue and brain to start working together again.

Aiba blinked once, then grinned, and through his haze of aghast perplexity, Nino realized his best friend was anxious.

"Does it change anything?" Aiba asked. Despite the grin on his face, his posture was stiff.

For a moment, Nino couldn't breathe. Then it all clicked back into place, at least enough for him to suppress his immediate response, because the fact was: it really didn't. Aiba could be bisexual or straight or gay or _whatever_ , and it didn't change the fact that he wasn't in love with Nino.

What he was, as ever, was Nino's best friend.

Instead of freaking out any further, Nino mustered up some compassion. "Of course not, Aiba-chan," he said as calmly as he could, and he bumped his shoulder against Aiba's still figure in attempt to bring them both back to normality.

Aiba recovered suspiciously quickly. "Oh good! Because this weekend is full of lovey-dovey things for us, so it'd be weird if it was weird."

" _You_ are weird," Nino groaned, heart thumping unsteadily as he remembered Aiba being into dudes wasn't the most jarring thing he'd deal with even within the hour. "Hold up, this Captain person and Sho-san person, they go on long camping trips together in their own camper van? I'm sure that eccentric and expensive and time-consuming relationship doesn't at all put a damper on their romantic endeavors."

"Nah, it's all good," Aiba said blithely. "You'll see. You've never seen a more secure friendship." After a beat, he wrapped his elbow around Nino's neck and craned even closer to give him a failure of a wink. "Other than ours, I mean, Nino-chan!"

Nino didn't bother to shrug him off this time, just said darkly, "A lot less secure than before I knew you'd signed us up to spend time in that rickety little box with two strangers."

"Not strangers to me! Besides, there'll be six of us."

Nino pulled away a few steps and stared at him, thoughts of yelling, backing out, and moderate violence in his eyes. Aiba, oblivious, looked cheerily into the distance toward the RV, hands on his hips in a jaunty fashion.

Indeed, after a moment he added, "It's a full expedition, you see! Captain and Gakky, you and me, and the recipients of our help--just wait until you see them in action, Nino, they're so awkward it's like they're doing it on purpose."

"That thing is about the size of your closet. Where the fuck will we sleep?"

Aiba grinned at him. "Right next to each other, don't worry! Ready to go?" He held out his hand, eyes alight with excited mischief.

"If only I'd brought my own car," Nino sighed, but he took Aiba's hand and tried to ignore the alarmed clamor of his unprotected heart.

Still smiling, Aiba laced their fingers together and took a step, but Nino didn't move. Ahead, someone had come out of the RV, and they were just far away enough that he couldn't be sure, but--

The figure turned and waved briskly.

Nino gripped Aiba's hand tightly in sheer astonishment. "Is that _Jun-kun_?!"

===

Forty minutes later, they were on the road. Nino, having scraped through the reunion with Jun, introductions to the rest, and first half hour of his fake relationship with Aiba, was pretending to sleep from a desperate sense of self-preservation.

It might have felt like more of a respite if he weren't lying cuddled close to Aiba.

Captain, real name Ohno Satoshi, and Sho-chan, full name Sakurai Sho, had bought a motor home and named it Super Soul, which seemed to round out most of Aiba's explanation earlier which had needed so very many footnotes, except for the part where Ohno was in a romantic relationship with Gakky, also known as Aragaki Yui, and Sho was dating _Jun-kun_ , the Matsumoto Jun who'd been friends with Nino and Aiba in high school... who'd actually known Nino longer than Aiba, though with a gap of many years, and who, even if it hadn't ever been romantic, had been Nino's first partner in experimentation. More bluntly, he'd been the first boy Nino ever kissed.

It wasn't part of the plan at all, and it wasn't like Aiba hadn't known about it. This boyfriend of Sho's wasn't some stranger in need of a random lesson in skinship. This was someone who'd been an extremely close friend to them both, someone who could read Nino from years of practice.

Nino squeezed his eyes shut tighter in protest of just how realistically in love with Aiba he was going to have to show himself to be in the next few days.

On the other hand... it was good to see his old friend again. The fumbling teenager had become a composed and striking man, but there was no doubt this was still the kind, earnest Jun-kun Nino had known. It made Nino wish he weren't leaving again: if he stayed, he could see this old-new friend all the time.

Aiba shifted under Nino's arm, talking to Jun in a quiet voice in deference to Nino's supposed exhaustion from work. Nino had used his last shred of self-control to apologize self-deprecatingly for needing to sleep so badly. Since then he'd feigned sleep while listening to the easy conversation with as much of his brain as he could, since he certainly needed the distraction from the multitude of emotional pressures of the day. Practically, the more he knew about these people, the easier it would be to convince them he and Aiba were really dating.

Sho had moved up to take the first turn driving after a spirited game of rock-paper-scissors, and Nino hadn't heard a single word from Ohno since their ritual yelling of _Super Soul we are go go go go!_ on departure, but Gakky contributed to the conversation of Aiba and Jun at times, her voice quiet but self-assured.

His impression of Ohno and Gakky was that they were a comfortable, slightly out of it couple. When the polite greetings had been finished, they'd both looked at Nino and pointed lazily at each other as if to get something straight from the start.

"He's Oh-chan," she'd said, smiling a little.

"She's Gakky," he'd said, face deadpan.

In return, Nino had pointed at himself and said with gentle mockery, "He's Nino," but they'd only nodded like everything was now settled.

Sho, who stayed proper throughout, looked helplessly fond, which made Nino like him already, and Jun had only snorted.

Aiba, still clutching Nino's hand, had looked around the small circle of people and smiled like he couldn't possibly be happier. Nino suspected part of the reasoning behind this crackbrained plan was to make some new friends for Nino himself, who unapologetically preferred to be ensconced in his home.

Nino also suspected part of Aiba wanting him to have more friends was to try to keep him in Tokyo, though neither of them had acknowledged that he might leave again. He didn't intend to ask.

Super Soul, which had been introduced as if it had a personality of its own, had one little room wedged in the rear next to a tiny, tiny bathroom with a stunted toilet and what Nino assumed was supposed to be a shower, and another bed in front up over the cab like a cramped but surprisingly snug little loft. In between was the wee kitchen across from the somewhat less wee dinette, which supposedly folded into one more bed even if Nino couldn't see how.

As the guest of Aiba, who was a guest to begin with, Nino had been given the choice of where he--and his boyfriend--would sleep. Everyone had looked sincere in their offer of any of the three ( _tiny_ ) locations, but Nino didn't have the heart to steal away the only bed with the slightest semblance of privacy. He couldn't bring himself to take the dinette, though, so he chose the bunk over the cab, which would at least be his and Aiba's own space the whole time, even it had no wall or even a curtain over the opening to the rest of the RV.

Ohno and Gakky had promptly taken the bed in the back, which seemed to be their usual spot, and Jun and Sho were relegated to the dinette. Interestingly, they hadn't seemed at all disappointed. They'd stowed their belongings in the overhead cabinets and sat down, discussing Sho's proposed plan of exploration for the weekend while the other four got settled in. Aiba followed suit with his and Nino's luggage, somehow graceful in the limited space. Nino hovered awkwardly in the doorway with one foot on the step and one foot inside the RV. At the first opening he scooted for the small ladder and up into his nook of a temporary bedroom.

After far too short an interval, Aiba was up there with him, and there ensued a conversation conducted entirely in gestures in which they argued about how to show their intimate couplehood when they barely fit in the small space at all. It was more difficult than it should have been since they were higher up than everyone else, which decreased what they could show, and they could neither sit up nor lie with both their heads toward the opening, because there simply wasn't room. All they could do was lie side by side with one person visible from the outside and one visible only when the other occupants were standing up and looking at them directly. After many emphatic movements to try and communicate his idea, Aiba had simply turned on his back and pulled Nino's arm around his body. Whether the next idea originated with Nino or Aiba was a blur, but Nino's head ended up snuggled on Aiba's shoulder.

In this way, they fit better in the space, Nino reasoned with guilty giddiness, and the people in the rest of the RV could see Nino's arm was lying across Aiba, which was very intimate, surely, and if they stood, they'd see him sleeping there on his fake boyfriend...

His fake boyfriend who was real and warm and horribly _touchable_ with their bodies pressed together like this, as if touching this much only made Nino want to touch Aiba more. He was tempted either to kiss him or shove him off the bunk to relieve his feelings, and he wasn't sure which impulse was stronger.

"No, no, we've only been together for a couple months," Aiba said, a little less quietly than before.

Nino recognized his cue and responded to it despite his turmoil, which was unsurprising even to him. Aiba hadn't been off-base when he said Nino liked pranks and games, and Nino had once had dreams of being an actor. What the situation called for was a bit of a sleepy grope of Aiba's torso, and Nino followed through with glee.

As if Nino had written the script, Gakky said with a quiet chuckle, "Really? You seem like you've been together forever, Aiba-chan."

"We've known each other forever, but we only realized our couple potential when he came back from the wilds of Hokkaido," Aiba said soulfully. Nino gave him a little pinch for the overacting. Aiba cleared his throat and said less soulfully, "Um, so maybe we've kind of skipped ahead in the relationship timeline."

"It's not like Nino to be so hasty," Jun said, but he sounded pleased. "He had such a crush on you all through high school, so I guess it makes sense."

Nino's whole body went cold at the thought that _this was it_ , now Aiba was finally going to get it, but Aiba only stage-whispered back down to Jun like it was all part of the game, "He told me that when I confessed to him and it was the cutest thing I've seen in my life. Have you ever seen Nino blush?"

Jun's low laugh mingled with a voice saying, "Nino is cute, after all." After a beat, Nino realized it must have been Ohno.

"Oh-chan," Gakky said, "You barely just met him. You'll put him off saying weird things like that so soon."

"It's not weird," Ohno said stubbornly. "He's cute. You think so too, and so does Matsujun, and I bet Sho-chan, too, so there."

Nino wasn't at all sure how to feel, especially when Ohno added, "Aiba-chan most of all, right?"

"Of course!" Aiba said loudly, grabbing Nino's hand. "I won't lose to you in finding Nino cute, Oh-chan, so don't get any ideas!" Despite his volume and the strong grip of his hand, the only thing Nino could focus on was the way Aiba was brushing a thumb gently back and forth over the inside of Nino's wrist. It wouldn't be obvious to those below, so it must be for another reason... comfort? Pacification? Nino did feel like he was leaning more and more toward shoving Aiba off the bunk rather than kissing him, and Aiba usually had good instincts about that sort of thing.

Though not always, Nino thought in the next moment, because that was when Aiba said, "Oooh, and did I tell you the sweetest thing: the first time I kissed him, he cried."

There was a chorus of disapproval from below at Aiba's fake oversharing, but Nino cut through all of it with a sharpness that was decidedly not fake. "Tonight I'll be murdering you in your sleep, Aiba-san."

"But--" Aiba said sulkily, trying to sit up. He promptly bonked his head on the ceiling and was still cursing when Ohno said slowly, "Can you do it without any blood? We only have one set of spare sheets."

Nino pushed Aiba back down so he could lean over him and say grandly, "For you, Oh-chan, anything."

Gakky laughed from her place in the narrow aisle and gave Ohno's cheek a poke. "You got lucky he's weird, too," she said down to him. Ohno, his head in her lap, nodded gravely at Nino before laughing helplessly up at her. Nino, after his deadpan moment of weirdo bonding with Ohno, looked over at Jun to share his amusement in turn.

His friend from middle school was looking at him curiously. Nino kept a smile on his face as he cursed internally. Jun had always been in tune with other people's emotions, mostly because he put so much effort into noticing them.

"My head hurts," Aiba said sulkily, and Nino promptly took the excuse to escape Jun's sharp gaze by saying dotingly, "Here, I'll make it better."

He leaned down and pressed his lips against Aiba's forehead, enjoying Aiba's startled face. As soon as he made to move away, a little shaken by just how real it felt, Aiba grabbed him tight in a hug.

"I knew you were kidding about being mad," he said, laughing. "You'd miss me too much to murder me, right? Right?"

Struggling to breathe, Nino had half a second to decide if his next course of action was believable when he was supposed to be Aiba's adoring boyfriend, but it was pretty much a foregone conclusion. After peeking over the side as he extricated himself to make sure there wasn't anything Aiba could hit his head on, he gave Aiba's hips one hard shove.

Aiba yelped, limbs flailing as he tried to balance himself, but, as Nino had calculated, his lower body was already falling off their bunk. Nino was laughing before Aiba's feet touched the floor, and when Aiba landed in a heap at Jun's feet only to have Jun nonchalantly use him as a footrest, Nino thought there was hope for this godforsaken trip being fun after all.

===

They arrived--somewhere. Nino wasn't sure where they were and he didn't especially care. They were parked in a clearing just off a well-maintained dirt road, but the campsite (if that's what it was) looped around slightly to give the impression that they were entirely surrounded by trees. Something in the air let Nino know they were near water, and they were definitely in a mountainous area, given the sickening ups and downs Super Soul had traversed in the last hour of their trip.

Wilderness. And no way to escape the stupid clean air and scenic splendor of it all, either.

Nino fiddled with his phone as he stretched his wobbly legs a few feet from the RV, which had become a beacon of civilization to him in comparison to everything else. He wasn't quite sure what the protocol for being in the wilderness on purpose was, but if anyone forced him to hike up a mountain, he planned to tell Aiba that only one of the two of them was coming back down.

He'd shamelessly escaped the RV first without asking if Aiba needed help with anything, but now he looked over to smile awkwardly at the disembarking Gakky, who smiled awkwardly back. She paused outside the motor home's door, then took three steps to her left and dropped both bags she'd brought out.

Nino watched with awe as she proceeded to find the nearest shady patch of grass and lie down, limbs sprawled comfortably, and close her eyes like she'd finished her activities for the day.

He briefly considered following suit, awkward stranger interaction be damned, but Ohno came out next and promptly whined, "Gakky, you said you'd help this time." He put the toolbox and bag he carried down next to her bags and walked over to poke at her with his foot.

"Mmhmm," Gakky said. Her eyes didn't open. "Don't forget to pack the cooler, Oh-chan."

Ohno huffed and crossed back to their stuff. "The fish'll know. They'll know you didn't help and you won't get bites at all!"

Nino, still hunched awkwardly in the crisp air and warm sunshine, suppressed a wince. Fishing, while admirably lazy the majority of the time, tended to involve boats. He wondered if Aiba would find it romantic to nurse Nino in his seasickness, then decided with a sigh that he probably would.

"Don't worry," Ohno said to him, obviously sulking even as he started with practiced ease on whatever was required to set up their campsite. "You don't have to help... you're a guest."

Nino turned his head to find Ohno paused in the act of picking out tools. He was looking up at Nino expectantly, as if he thought Nino would surely _offer_ to help when Ohno had been so gracious about it. Pasting on a toothy smile, Nino said, "You are very kind, Oh-chan!" and walked briskly over to flop down on the soft grass a short distance from Gakky.

She huffed a laugh as Ohno started to grumble, and for a moment all was right in Nino's topsy-turvy world, but then, inevitably, came Aiba's voice.

"Ah, there you are, Nino-chan! Want me to princess-carry you over here so Jun-kun can give us our chores?"

Nino knew a threat when he heard one. He slitted his eyes open enough to glare in a hopefully friendly fashion at Gakky. "How come it doesn't work on you?"

She smiled and opened her eyes, and he was pleased to see some of her reserve had dropped away. "I'd just let him carry me, then not help anyway. It makes him itch to have chores undone, and he wants to get fishing... it wouldn't take long to wait him out."

Aiba yelled with unnecessary volume and cheer, "Nino, I'm coming! I can hardly wait to have you in my arms again--"

Nino got light-headed from standing up so fast, but it was worth it for both the disappointed look on Aiba's face and the way it made Gakky laugh with an endearing inelegance.

"I was obviously already getting up," Nino lied, giving an offended sniff as he walked back over to Super Soul.

Jun and Sho had emerged with bags in hand, and the four of them made an impromptu camp of operations in front of the door with Jun the clear leader. Ohno, it seemed, had his own priorities and worked through them steadily despite the muttering under his breath which was clearly aimed at Gakky.

"All right, Nino, Aiba-chan: you're in charge of finding wood for the fire. Ah," he said firmly, holding up a staying hand, "I don't want to hear whatever double entendre you have about wood, Aiba-chan, so stuff it."

Aiba managed to pout for half a second before he was laughing about stuffing wood.

Jun ignored this with ease, and Nino remembered that he and Aiba had been friends again for years now while Nino had been gone. He wondered why Aiba hadn't mentioned it when he'd seemed to report all the other minutiae of his life during their weekly video calls and near-daily texts, but then he was distracted by watching Jun and Sho.

While they'd huddled up to discuss the game plan, Jun had thrown an arm companionably around Aiba's shoulders, but Nino realized he hadn't done the same to Sho, even though they were standing quite close enough for it to be easy. It was kind of weird, actually... they were standing close from their shoulders down to their feet, but no part of them touched. Every time one moved a millimeter closer, the other seemed to move just enough that no part of them brushed. They did it without looking, without even seeming to do it on purpose, and Nino found himself fascinated by how they could be so in sync when it came to something like that.

Still surreptitiously looking at the way Sho tilted his body back when Jun's arm gestured to the side, Nino experimentally took Aiba's hand and gave him a little tug. Aiba, confused but willing, stepped toward him while nodding eagerly along to Jun's detailed instructions on just the kind of wood they'd need.

Jun's arm slipped away comfortably, leaving him standing alone--but incredibly close to Sho. Nino, pretending not to watch the couple, lifted Aiba's hand and stepped even more into his space, and by the time he was done, Aiba had his arm around Nino's shoulders with Nino's hand still caught warmly in his.

It felt so good, being all casually entwined with Aiba, but Nino focused on how Sho and Jun would react. It was too awkward to stand there so close without touching while another couple were all wrapped up in each other, surely, but it was exactly what they did. Nino's eyes widened at the stiff synchronicity of it all.

"Got that, Nino?" Jun asked, eyebrows drawn together in obvious skepticism.

Nino grinned and jerked his free hand at Aiba still pressed against him. "He's got it, I'm just here to look pretty."

"And who could fault him when he's so very good at--oof!" Fresh from an elbow to the stomach, Aiba laughed loudly and a little painfully, but he didn't let go. "And I do have it, Jun-kun! And... what will you and Sho-chan be doing?"

"I'll be setting up for the barbecue later," Jun said. He looked distant for a moment, clearly perusing a mental checklist.

Aiba said with tentative hope, "With Sho-chan?"

"Hm?" Jun asked, then flicked his eyes at Sho, who straightened like a soldier awaiting orders. "No, it'll be faster without him. Sho-kun's job is to find the place where our cell phones get the best reception. _Without_ getting lost or otherwise damaged," Jun added sharply.

"Break one bone and you're on the incompetent list forever," Sho grumbled, but he got his phone out and trudged off into the woods.

Jun nodded peremptorily at Nino and Aiba before heading off in the exact opposite direction as his boyfriend.

Aiba's shoulders slumped. Mindful of Ohno around the back of the RV doing something intricate with tubes and nozzles, plus Gakky by the edge of the clearing, though she was convincingly asleep by then, he hissed, "See? It's heartbreaking; we have to help them."

He was still pressed against Nino, still wrapped around him so sweetly, and he smelled weirdly good for someone who'd been cooped up in a small space for the past few hours.

"First we have to get the firewood," Nino said, pulling away. It took a few seconds for Aiba to let go, and when he finally did, it was only long enough to unloop his arm so he could grab Nino's hand again.

"I bet there's some good kindling over there," he said and pointed off in a seemingly random direction.

"Really," Nino said, eyebrows raised. He was going to mock further, but Aiba was already trotting off into the trees and towing Nino along with him.

When they'd put a fair amount of distance between them and their camp, Nino got out at last, "You can let go of my hand now." He tried to sound long-suffering without betraying his sudden panic. He'd just had an awful premonition he was going to forget this thing with Aiba wasn't real.

Aiba looked down at their linked hands like he'd forgotten they were touching, then held on tighter. "No way, we need to practice!"

Nino tugged halfheartedly at his hand. He was afraid he already knew the answer to his next question. "Practice what?"

"Don't you remember? We owe them a really good kiss, Nino, and now you know just how much they need it."

Trying to keep up with Aiba's pace without tripping over anything and breaking something when they were who knew how many miles from a hospital, Nino said caustically, "What I remember is that you never explained why one kiss, really good or not, would break the spell those two are under, if they even are--" At Aiba's sound of indignation, Nino said hurriedly, "And I admit they are, okay, they are intriguingly weird with each other, but how is the sight of us, uhhhhh..."

"Kissing," Aiba said helpfully. "It's all part of the plan." He looked at Nino suspiciously, pausing in his stride, and asked, "You did listen to the plan, right, Nino?"

Nino waved his free hand in front of his face frantically. "Oh yes! God, please, don't say it all again."

Aiba resumed walking, thankfully at a slower pace, and started swinging their linked hands merrily between them. "Then you can see why we need to practice kissing, Nino! It'll hardly be the eye-opening, life-changing kiss we need it to be if it's our first one."

Nino conceded his hand to Aiba's continued care in order not to call attention to his inability to get the kiss over and done already. He said with as much nonchalance as he could muster, "But it isn't, so we'll be fine."

The fact that he was voluntarily bringing up the drunken time he kissed Aiba was probably a sign of the apocalypse, but desperate times called for desperate measures. He only realized he'd automatically closed his eyes at the wrench of saying it out loud when he stumbled and was saved from falling on his face by Aiba's unrelenting grip on his hand.

Aiba had stopped walking. After a moment, Nino opened his eyes.

"Do you remember that night?" Aiba asked, eyes dark and fixed on Nino's expression.

Nino forced a smile but couldn't get any words out, so he shook his head.

Aiba smiled back at him. It looked different than usual, different from the hundreds of kinds of smiles Nino had received over the years, but there was no chance to analyze it. Aiba was barreling on with his plan already.

"I thought so. Then we still need to practice!"

Nino gave a disdainful little shrug. It was the best he could do, because Aiba hadn't started walking again. He was just standing there, holding Nino's hand, looking into Nino's eyes, talking about _kissing_...

If Nino didn't know that Aiba could always beat him in a foot-race, he'd be tempted to sprint off into the trees, wilderness or not.

Aiba, with continued unfairness, touched his fingertips to his own lips. "What kind of kiss do you think would be most effective, Nino-chan?"

Under the guise of a considering gesture of his own, Nino extracted his hand. He said, "How about an Eskimo kiss?"

Aiba's eyes went round, processing this, and then they narrowed in outrage, but his snatching motion caught only air. Nino had bolted away with a stifled laugh, saying loudly, "Or we could show them the emotional glory of mime!"

"You get back here!" Aiba yelled, giving enthusiastic chase.

As so often happened in Aiba's company, Nino forgot himself. He darted around a tree and peeked out at Aiba, who was charging at him like a provoked bull.

"A butterfly kiss?" he wondered innocently, then sprinted for another hiding place as Aiba made a grab for him. He called breathlessly over his shoulder, "Or a kiss on the hand? There are so many kinds of kisses, Aiba-shi, and I think we should be creative!"

"I'll show you creative," Aiba promised as he stalked purposefully around a mossy log. "Just wait until I catch you--"

"I've got it," Nino caroled, dashing around a large rock. "You can blow me a kiss! I feel that would be most instructive, and Jun-kun would..." He broke off into helpless laughter as Aiba caught his wrist and advanced on him threateningly.

Aiba was laughing, too, and Nino was so happy in that moment that he forgot to be afraid.

"They were only suggestions," he complained, eyes sparkling up at Aiba. "You don't have to take it so personally."

"I'll show you my suggestion, then," Aiba returned. His voice was a little raspy from all the chasing, but he sounded almost serious. Nino squinted suspiciously, wondering if Aiba meant to do something awful to him, but then he saw Aiba's gaze drop to his mouth. It jerked back up at once, but Nino's whole body went hot at the sight of it.

He meant to take a step back, but somehow when he moved, it was toward Aiba.

"It looks to me like I'm the only one with any ideas," he said, just to fill the silence, but then Aiba was stepping closer, too, and he still had hold of Nino's wrist. His capable hand wrapped around it completely, so warm that it felt like a promise.

"You make it hard to think," Aiba complained back, quietly enough that Nino was abruptly aware of how alone they were, how there was no one to pretend for but the surrounding trees. Aiba was still moving closer.

Nino lifted his chin, having to look up a lot more now that Aiba was so near, and Aiba's gaze dropped back down to Nino's mouth.

It was a good thing, too, because Nino could sense that if Aiba got a good look at his eyes right then, there wouldn't be any doubt as to whether Nino was faking his feelings.

Just to be safe, Nino closed them. Holding his breath, he also tipped his head slightly to the right, heart racing as he waited for just what sort of suggestion Aiba was planning on demonstrating.

He couldn't remember their first kiss, but he was determined to remember every instant of this one.

He heard Aiba take a breath, a short, nervous intake of air, and Nino's lips parted involuntarily because Aiba was so close, so _close_...

"Ah, you're here! Matsujun wants--oops."

At the first sound of Ohno's voice, Nino's head jerked back, but it seemed Aiba's jerked forward at the same time. Before Ohno got to his third word, Aiba's lips bumped awkwardly against Nino's and immediately away again.

Nino's eyes flew open. It had happened so fast that he hadn't felt much of anything.

It was unbelievable. He'd now kissed Aiba twice, but he still didn't know what it felt like, which was enough to make him want to boot Ohno into the nearest lake before wrapping his arms around Aiba's neck and kissing him for as long as oxygen held out.

He might have done the latter part, too, if Aiba hadn't still been holding onto his wrist, and then Aiba said, "That doesn't count."

Nino, eyes clearing from his kissing haze, saw Aiba looked strangely stubborn.

"That doesn't count," Aiba repeated, full mouth tilting in a frown. "That was barely anything!"

"Um," came Ohno's apologetic voice. "Matsujun said I wasn't to come back without you. And something about firewood but that's not my job and I'm not carrying any because the fish are waiting and I need all my muscles for them."

As one, Nino and Aiba turned their heads to the side to stare at Ohno. Aiba whispered, "I've never heard him say so many words all in a row."

"Gakky was right about him and the fish, then," Nino said, smiling despite himself.

Ohno's embarrassed sulk deepened. He snapped halfheartedly, "What doesn't count?"

Aiba's hand clenched on Nino's wrist, startled, but Nino said smoothly, "I told Aiba-san he only got one kiss out of me in the woods and that was it."

Ohno nodded like that made total sense. "There are probably bears out here, you know."

"But Nino," Aiba started, face flushed.

Nino interrupted, "He's wrong about most things, Oh-chan, if we're being honest, but for once he was right and that didn't count."

He couldn't think of a reason he'd ever concede that, other than the truth, so he pulled away with a flourish and strolled over to link arms with Ohno.

"Lead the way, Oh-chan!"

Ohno frowned. "The firewood? Obviously I don't care, but Matsujun--"

Nino gestured back at Aiba, seemingly shocked into stillness behind them. "Don't I have the best boyfriend ever? He said he'd carry all of it."

Ohno huffed and started off, his sleepy face amused, and Nino followed. He clung a little more than he might have otherwise because he was still dazed, still helplessly wanting, and more than a little confused. It had been a long time since he'd been confused about his feelings for Aiba, and somehow it made it all feel new again.

He waited as long as he could before looking back, but Aiba was still in the area where they'd left him. In fact, he was gathering firewood with great purpose, and it sounded like he was whistling a Morning Musume song.

Despite the thwarted kiss and how close he'd come to getting caught, Nino found he was smiling.

===

Nino and Ohno got back to the campsite to find Gakky had cracked open a beer and Jun was finishing dragging logs around the fire pit, presumably for seating.

The fire pit was noticeably empty of wood, and Jun turned on them at once.

"Where is it, Nino?"

"Don't worry, Jun-kun," Nino said kindly. "Aiba-chan's getting it. I rushed back here, you see, to catch up with my dearest old friend." He paused as if waiting for Jun's gratitude, then said delicately, "That would be you, of course."

Jun rolled his eyes and turned to nudge his last log an inch to the side as if it needed to be in the perfect position.

"I'm going fishing now," Ohno announced.

Gakky got up from her lolling and handed him her beer. "I'm ahead of you, so finish this off for me, all right?" As he complied, obviously doing it in one long swig so he could finally get to his fish, she pulled off her t-shirt and shorts.

Ohno wiped his mouth and looked at her with abstracted eyes. Nino didn't need to be attracted to women to appreciate that Gakky was especially suited to standing easy in the sunny forest with nothing on but a pink and yellow striped bikini.

She stood with oblivious composure as Jun gave a fond little sigh and picked up her strewn clothing, no doubt to be folded and stowed somewhere. Whether to herself or someone else, she mumbled, "I put the sunscreen in, and my book, and--"

"Don't forget the umbrella," Jun said, returning from Super Soul. "There's no shade out there, you know."

"And a towel," Gakky finished, smiling at Jun before turning back to her boyfriend. "We'll have to share, though, because only one'll fit in the cooler."

Nino whispered to Jun, "Why would a towel go in the cooler...?" but it was Ohno who replied happily, "It floats."

This didn't clarify anything to Nino, but he just shrugged and made for the RV. He needed a break from the wilderness, and he had some feelings that needed working through, alone, with no requirement for pretense.

Before he reached the open door, through which he could already see Gakky's shirt and shorts in a neat stack waiting for her return, Nino was stopped by Jun's arm around his shoulders.

"I've changed my mind," Jun said, giving him a firm squeeze. "Let's catch up."

"Inside?" Nino said hopefully, but he didn't put up a fight when Jun steered them off after the retreating forms of Ohno and Gakky.

They were walking down a hill, a pleasant breeze making Nino hate the wilderness a little less than the moment before, when Jun asked, "So what's going on with you and Aiba-chan?"

"I'm in love with the idiot," Nino said glibly. He immediately wished he hadn't, because it sounded--it was--too much the truth. Fooling everyone was supposed to be a game, a prank, not a way to bare his fucking soul. "Should we be worried about your boyfriend not being back?"

Jun snorted, not fooled by Nino's attempt to distract him, but answered readily enough, "He's fine. I wouldn't say he's naturally good at hiking or finding his way, but he prepares so much that to get lost he'd have to fall into a cave or some such, and even then he'd probably have mapped a way out of it two weeks before."

"Sounds like you're in love with that idiot, too," Nino said, careful to use a gentle tone so Jun didn't get mad about him calling Sho an idiot. It was only a quote, after all: Sho seemed great, the type of impressive but also kind person Nino would have picked for his friend. He wondered if he could get away with asking Jun about the way he and Sho never seemed to touch.

But this time, Jun didn't follow his lead. "When did you tell Aiba-chan you loved him?" he asked, hooking an arm through Nino's to help him keep his footing on the increasingly uneven path.

"What, he didn't tell you all about it?" Nino stalled.

As Jun answered in the negative, they arrived within sight of the lake, giving Nino an excuse to stop talking. Jun nearly tripped over Ohno's discarded shirt, but he bent to pick it up despite his cursing, leaving Nino to stare at Ohno and Gakky standing on the little rocky beach ahead.

"Where's the boat?" he asked, looking left and right, but this seemed to be the only approach to the water that didn't involve rappelling down through steep tumbles of undergrowth.

Jun pointed, but not at the shore. "They'll just swim out to the float, as usual."

Nino squinted and saw that part of the glare in the middle of the lake gave a different, darker gleam: wood rather than water.

"Later, we'll all swim there together," Jun said. He knew Nino well enough not to make it a question, but Nino didn't mind swimming every once in a while, especially when the alternative he'd pictured was having to get on a boat.

Nino watched Gakky and Ohno strike out into the water, their sizable red cooler bobbing behind them. By the time they reached the float, Jun was back to lead Nino to a lawn chair he seemed to have produced from thin air. It was a nice one, too, with a footrest and everything. Nino sank into it with a sigh of thanks to Jun, who went to get another one from a little lean-to by the beach.

When Jun had settled down in his chair next to Nino, he picked up right where he'd left off.

"Aiba-chan's been cagey about it, which isn't like him. I assume you're the one who confessed?"

Nino wriggled into a more comfortable position as he thought. Given how much he trusted Jun, even after so many years, he decided to go with the truth as much as possible. "I've loved him forever, you know that."

He had to stop there to breathe for a second. It was the first time he'd told anyone and meant it, ever; Jun had known in high school, just from observation, but Nino hadn't ever said it out loud as a way to communicate his honest feelings.

Jun, perceptive and caring as Nino remembered, was quiet, waiting for Nino to be ready to go on.

Nino cleared his throat. "Well, he was straight--" He broke off, realizing that he didn't have to lie here either. Aiba had come out as bi, for real, not in this farce they were enacting. "But it turns out he's not," he said more softly than he meant to. He cleared his throat again.

"I met him again in a gay bar, you know," Jun said reminiscently, which didn't make a whole lot of sense to Nino until he finished, "I think he was trying to be as visibly queer as he possibly could, because he was just figuring it out? There was a lot of fishnet involved, Nino. A _lot._ "

Nino laughed, pressing his hands over his mouth to keep it in, but it was too good of an image to pass up. "I hope you took pictures?"

"No, but I bet you could get him to dress up in them again," Jun said mischievously.

"Right," Nino choked, "I bet I could..." He groped for the next logical thing to say to move on. "Um, so I--I was gone for five years, you know, and--"

"Why did you leave?" Jun asked.

Nino hesitated. "... I got drunk and kissed him," he blurted out, only because it was Jun listening, and Jun understood him and wouldn't hurt him for anything.

"So you ran."

"It wasn't just that," Nino said, sighing at Jun's careful neutrality. "Look, when I'm around him, when I'm seeing him all the time, I can't be with anyone else, and I can't--I can't be alone all the time, I just can't, no matter how much I love him. I need to have someone, I need the touching and the sex and the letting go with someone who's letting go with you--when I lived here, I couldn't do it. Everyone I was with, I was picturing Aiba-chan, and then I lost control even with him, so I was risking everything with him on top of having nothing with anyone else, not unless I wanted to treat someone as only a substitute..."

The unexpected torrent of words should have mortified him, but it was Jun... it was _Jun_ , the first person he'd told he was gay, the first boy he'd kissed, the first person, along with Aiba, he'd ever gotten drunk with, and Nino desperately needed to talk to someone. Even so, he rested his arm over his head and hid his face in his elbow, trying to keep his breathing steady.

Jun made a patient, considering noise, then asked, "And while you were gone?"

Though Jun couldn't see, Nino nodded. "It was easier. God, I missed him, but he didn't have to be the only one... it was like from a distance I could forget him just enough to be with someone else, even for a little while."

It was only then, after all of his words, that he remembered that Jun thought there was a happy ending to this story, that Nino was sitting there having confessed--and having been accepted.

He couldn't bring himself to say anything else. He wasn't ready to tell the truth and upset Aiba, who was so intent on this ridiculous plan, and he didn't want to lie to Jun right then, not after telling the truth for the first time.

He and Jun sat there in silence for what felt like a long time. Nino stared out at the water, trying to calm down, and after a while he became aware that Jun wasn't waiting for him to speak. He was genuinely letting Nino be done talking, even though he hadn't finished the story, even though what he'd said didn't make sense with what Jun knew--with what Jun thought he knew about Nino and Aiba.

Nino opened his mouth to say thank you, then closed it again. When he finally spoke, it was to say something entirely different.

"I'm sorry, are Oh-chan and Gakky out there making out?"

"Oh yeah, they do that," Jun said comfortably. He yelled at the top of his voice, "Use the umbrella, you two!"

The hazy, entwined figures out on the float broke apart, and one of them made a rude gesture. "You don't have to look!" came Gakky's embarrassed voice back over the water, but the other figure was putting the umbrella up in a hurry.

Jun chuckled, settling back in his chair. "The umbrella's for Ohno-kun... he gets self-conscious later when he thinks about people seeing."

Nino watched as Ohno finished opening the umbrella and set it on its side, giving a small space on the float which couldn't be seen from shore. Gakky had turned away to get another beer from the floating cooler, but when he put his hands on her shoulders, turning her back toward him, she wrapped her arms around his waist and kissed him. After a second, without stopping, she made another rude gesture toward Jun, but then Ohno was pulling her down carefully behind the umbrella so their upper bodies, at least, were shielded from view.

"Let's go," Jun said.

It only half-distracted Nino from contemplating the pretty picture of Ohno's tan, well-muscled legs under Gakky's, which were long and pale and absently kicking once in a while, like she was settled in to kiss Ohno until the fish bit or the sun went down, whichever came first.

"Aiba-chan should be back by now." This got Jun Nino's attention, and their recent conversation came back to punch him in the heart.

It hurt, but almost in a good way, like it was a hurt he'd needed to have.

After a moment staring into Jun's kind eyes, Nino decided cynically that that was crap. It hurt, so it was bad, and he wasn't going to do it again when it just let him wallow in useless feelings.

Jun said, "I'm glad it finally worked out for you two, Nino. You deserve to be happy, you know."

Nino said with brittle cheer, "I don't see where deserving comes into it, Jun-kun, but thank you! I am, you know--I am deliriously happy."

He turned away from Jun's sharp eyes, but the next moment, Jun was slinging an arm around his shoulders like nothing had happened.

"Good, because he's planned a surprise for you. Let's get back so you can enjoy it."

Nino sighed internally. After a moment, though, he relaxed into Jun's touch and let it comfort him.

He'd lie to Jun for now because Aiba wanted it--and because he couldn't give this fake relationship up quite yet--but later he'd apologize, and they'd be friends again, despite the distance he was going to put between them. Jun was worth the effort, after all. Just like Aiba.

He felt a strange pang at leaving Tokyo when Aiba got to stay and be friends with Sho, Gakky, Ohno, and especially Jun, but he didn't know the others enough for it to hurt yet, surely, so it was better that he was leaving soon.

"I can tell you're listening closely," Jun was saying.

Nino shook himself mentally and turned to smile at Jun. "A surprise, you said?"

Jun pointed across the clearing to where Aiba was standing by the RV. He was holding a baseball mitt and smiling so brightly Nino felt all his troubles disappear in the flash of it.

"Nino-chan!" Aiba called. "Let's play catch!"

Nino just stared, though he should've seen this coming since Aiba loved baseball as much as he did. Jun gave him a shove, and then Nino was walking quickly toward his fake boyfriend, only because he was worried that Aiba hadn't remembered to get him a lefty glove.

"Hey, I found the best spot," Sho said, walking from between the trees while still looking down at his phone. "It's pretty close, but it's tricky because it's between--oh, are you going to play baseball?"

It took Aiba a moment to shift his eyes away from Nino, but then he perked up even further in excited hope. "Do you want to play with us? Matsujun's playing too, you know!"

"Sho-kun's no good at baseball," Jun said. "And he has things to do, a whole list... Isn't that right, Sho-kun?"

Instead of looking rejected, Sho grinned. "A whole list is right; I found all the coolest places and I'm going to see _all_ of them. You're gonna be jealous, you guys!"

Jun brushed past him and picked up a glove from Super Soul's open door. "Be back before dark. None of this rushing at the end to see a few more landmarks and coming back when all the food's been eaten and then being in a bad mood the rest of the night."

Nino lifted his eyebrows at Aiba. That sounded like something Jun spoke of from experience.

Aiba said quickly, "But wouldn't you rather stay here with us? With Matsujun? Um, Matsujun, wouldn't you rather keep him here where it's safe and--"

"He's as safe out there as here," Jun said brusquely, then looked up at Sho with a twinkle in his eyes. "After all, I've seen him play baseball."

"Oi," Sho said without heat. "It's not that I can't play, it's that I _don't_ play, all right?"

"Sure," Jun agreed, grinning at him. "I'm sure that's true."

"But--" Aiba started again, his matchmaking plans going up in smoke.

Nino picked up the remaining glove and found it was indeed for his non-throwing right hand. Aiba could be an airhead, but it was like him to remember something like that.

"They're camping beginners, Sho-kun, so maybe it makes them anxious for you to be such an adventurer," Jun said lightly. "I know how you like to take commemorative pictures, so why don't you send them to us as you go along?"

Sho saluted, phone in hand. "See you soon."

Aiba let him go without further dispute, though he looked disappointed. Then he saw Nino had his mitt on and beamed at him. "Are you happy, Nino? I bought you that..." He looked furtively at Jun, who was staring coolly off after Sho, then finished, "For our two month anniversary."

Nino looked the glove over before smiling at Aiba with extra sweetness. "It's perfect," he said, barely keeping himself from a pet name just to fluster his fake boyfriend.

Aiba looked suddenly concerned. "Did you get a sunburn by the lake?" Then he was in Nino's space, running gentle fingers over his forehead, around his jaw, and up to tap his nose as if to test how the color came back after. Nino held his breath, torn between making a mocking comment (perhaps gratitude for Aiba putting his hands all over Nino's face) and giving Aiba's fingertips a kiss. He could do it because Jun was watching now, but he wasn't sure he could bear it if Aiba looked grossed out by the cheesy affection, even if he hid it for Jun's sake.

Actually, Jun was being strangely patient with them. Nino looked away from Aiba's too-close face and found Jun looking back at him. His serious expression turned inquiring, but Nino only smirked.

"Are we going to play baseball or what?"

===


	2. Chapter 2

===

An hour later, Nino was sweaty, dirty, and tired. His face actually hurt from smiling.

The sun was going down, so the three of them traipsed down to the lake to make themselves semi-presentable before they ate. Jun couldn't stop talking about how good it had felt to play baseball again, like nothing had changed since they were kids, and Aiba's face seemed to be stuck on high-beam.

Nino, because he wanted to and because he could right then, sneaked over to Aiba's side of the trail and held his hand.

When they got to the lake, Jun took Nino's other hand and he and Aiba just kept going, ignoring Nino's protests and increasingly alarmed wiggling.

"But my phone!" Nino tried.

Jun paused, but Aiba shook his head and continued walking. "He left it in Super Soul."

Accepting the inevitable, Nino went limp so they'd at least have to drag him. His feet were in the water--

"You could've at least let me take off my shoes," he complained at once.

\--then his legs were submerged, there was the shock of cold water in sensitive places, and they ducked Nino under and left him to swim free.

Nino pushed to the surface, gasping, but the water wasn't deep enough to be scary, nor was it cold enough to be unpleasant, so he dipped back under and rubbed the sweat and dirt off himself as best he could. It felt good, far better than he was planning to let on to his traitorous friends.

When he surfaced again, he looked for Aiba and Jun with thoughts of revenge.

First he saw Jun, but his old friend was nearly to the float already, and Nino was only about half the distance there. Nino noticed Ohno's lower body still sticking out from the umbrella, but Gakky was sitting on the other side, feet in the water, watching the three of them. When Nino met her eyes, she smiled and waved a little shyly, so he smiled and waved back.

Aiba ducked him again. Nino's mouth filled with water as he tried to yell, and when he came back up he was pointing at Gakky.

"You could've told me he was coming!" he screeched, but Aiba was giggling in his ear, high-pitched and evil, and Nino resigned himself to going under once more.

This time he let himself drop, and when his questing hands found Aiba's skinny ankles, he _yanked_.

The ensuing tussle was fairly evenly matched. Aiba had longer limbs and was generally stronger, but Nino was sneakier and less easily distracted. They were circling each other for the third or fourth time, joyful battle fury in their eyes, when their heads whipped around at a sound from nearby that was like a panic-stricken whale.

It seemed Jun had rolled Ohno right off the float and into the water.

"Did that noise come from _Ohno-san_?" Nino asked, awed, and Gakky spared him a nod from where she was fending Jun off with the umbrella. She was a lot closer now: it seemed that Nino and Aiba had unwittingly splashed their way toward their companions during their duel.

Gakky said, "He kicked him awake before he pushed him... probably so he didn't drown."

Ohno splashed up and out of the water, still making whale sounds but extremely angry ones now, and Jun turned away from his pursuit of Gakky to give him a wary look.

Gakky, seeing her chance, shoved him into the water, at which point Ohno stopped thrashing around and started purposefully around the float to get to Jun.

Nino turned to Aiba, eyes wide, and they nodded together in agreement. It didn't seem at all prudent to stay in the water with an enraged Ohno on the loose.

They were squelching their way into the lawn chairs within minutes, laughing and holding hands. Nino didn't try to pull his hand away even before Aiba whispered that Sho could come back at any minute so they had to stay convincing.

It was easy to go along with it, horribly easy to let all his defenses drop. It was almost embarrassing: except for that one kiss he couldn't remember, he'd kept his self-control for nearly two decades, and now here he was, giggling and clinging onto Aiba with his heart on his sleeve.

And yet, Nino found he didn't care that much. He might hate himself for it in the future, when he was off away again and trying to forget, but right then he had all his pent-up affection and a free pass to use it nearly any way he pleased. He didn't know if it had been in the water, or playing baseball, or maybe even while talking to Jun, but he'd given up spending every second reminding himself it wasn't real.

He had this one chance to live his fantasy. Angsting over it any longer felt like wasting it, and soon enough he'd be gone.

Nino eyed Aiba, who was watching the drama unfold in the lake with a light in his eyes no future recollection would capture correctly.

"Look, Gakky's going to ambush Oh-chan and--" Aiba cut off with a winded noise as Nino plopped down into his lap.

"Like you said," Nino said smugly, settling himself across Aiba with his head rested back on Aiba's shoulder. "Sho-san could be back at any moment."

Aiba didn't say anything, and the silence lasted long enough that Nino, despite his resolution, started to get antsy. It was true that he still had to keep it within the realm of a fake relationship between comfortably tactile best friends, and maybe he'd--

Then Aiba's arms came up and wrapped snugly around Nino's waist. His voice was pleased and rumbly as he said, "Wanna make this interesting? My money's on Jun-kun."

Nino considered the tableau as his body, which he knew logically was cold and clammy, warmed up from the inside out. Jun did seem to have an edge now that Gakky and Ohno had turned on each other, but Nino couldn't forget that wheezing bellow Ohno had let out as Jun pushed him into the water. He was thinking that eventually Ohno would decide that avenging that moment came before all else. And that single-mindedness might then put him at a disadvantage.

"Gakky," Nino said at last, following the motion of Ohno's dive for Jun. "Loser does all our chores for the rest of the trip."

"It seems like I'm doing all of them anyway," Aiba grumbled, but before Nino could say anything, he shouted, "C'mon, Matsujun! Go for her feet!"

Gakky turned in the water with a glint in her eye that had Nino yelling hurriedly, "I'm for you, Yui-chan! Jun-kun's weak if you come at him from behind!"

"He'll remember that," Sho said from behind them. "Did I hear something about a bet? Because my money's on Captain."

They exchanged solemn, damp handshakes. Sho sat in the empty chair with a yelp at the puddle Nino had left, and Nino curled up in Aiba's lap with a hidden smile. Together they watched the chaos on the lake as the sun sank into the mountains behind it.

===

Nino spent the rest of the evening in a fog of mundane happiness. It was full of good things, from food to scenery to weather to company, but it shouldn't have been as good as it was just from that.

The very fact that he could show his feelings for Aiba, even if the person he loved didn't know it was for real, lifted a weight from his mind that he'd been bearing so long he hadn't known how heavy it had grown. The respite was temporary, but he didn't stop to mourn, only set all his self-aware tendencies to one side and lived in the moment as best he could.

There also seemed to be a sort of alchemy in the mix of people. Sure, Jun and Sho were awkward together, mostly because they never seemed to touch (Nino watched them whenever he remembered to and still hadn't seen them so much as brush fingers), but it was a weirdly comfortable awkwardness, like maybe it was what worked for them. (Aiba was unconvinced.) They certainly seemed to trust each other, if the way Jun felt safe loosing his sharp tongue on Sho and the way Sho depended on Jun without worrying Jun would ever be disdainful was any indication. In a quiet way, they clearly cared about each other, as Nino realized when he noticed that every time Sho laughed, Jun looked over to see why so he could understand and join in on the amusement, and sometimes Sho would catch his gaze and point out whatever he thought was funny without even stopping laughing to say it in words.

Then there was Gakky, who rarely seemed fully in tune with the group's atmosphere while always seeming fully relatable, and Ohno, whose unassuming demeanor revealed an instinctive flair for genius within, whatever he turned it to. Nino didn't partake in any of the alcohol, not about to decrease his fallen inhibitions any further, but even so he somehow found his hands amiably groping Ohno's butt more than once before the evening was out. Aiba just laughed, delighted, and Jun and Sho had looked startled and amused, but Gakky had shrugged and said that sometimes she got Ohno to come with her to weightless yoga classes just because it gave the teachers such a thrill to be able to touch Ohno like that. When Nino had replied that it must be Ohno's butt's healing aura, she had grinned and agreed completely. Ohno had been busy cleaning his fish.

Gakky and Ohno together were quietly bantering mixed with moments of almost painful sweetness. She'd chide him about not helping wash the dishes, and he'd snap back, but the next second he'd be kissing her cheek and murmuring about how glorious she'd been in her triumph over Jun in the lake, how he'd wanted to throw himself at her feet. And Gakky would laugh and stammer her thanks, Nino saw, and she'd find a way to touch him soon after that, something simple, like resting a hand on his shoulder while he, as promised, washed the dishes.

Having a barbecue with two couples made it natural for Nino to be in one with Aiba. He didn't have to act when Aiba offered him a bite of meat to take from his hand, and he didn't have to fake his contented look when he settled back against Aiba on a log by the fire and Aiba put his arms around him. They told stories about when they were kids, and held hands, and made sure the other was comfortable and well-fed. Aiba got a little drunk, and Nino used it as an excuse to be even more handsy.

He'd hate himself later. Right then, it was wonderful.

When Aiba produced a guitar from the motor home and handed it to Nino, it was almost creepily idyllic.

Nino looked up at him with an arrested expression. "If you'd told me we were shooting a heartwarming music video, I would have worn more stylish clothes, you know."

After his first simple song, some psychic wavelength had Nino playing seriously and Ohno singing comically without their even having to discuss it. For the first time all evening, Aiba wasn't by Nino's side, but he sat across the circle and watched Nino with a small smile. The firelight flickering over his face made him even more beautiful than usual.

For his third song, Nino picked something rousing, and everyone joined in just as he'd hoped. He thought about how it wasn't just the couples whose chemistry was good: Ohno and Sho really were like an old married couple, so much so that they laughed at each other's jokes sometimes before the other even got to the punchline. And Jun seemed to make Gakky smile more than anyone else, and her droll, easygoing complaints made him laugh without any thought of dignity. Jun positively doted on Ohno, and Sho and Aiba had so much fun together that Nino was almost jealous. But not quite, because at least for that night, with the eating and the singing and the heat of the fire and the way they were (Nino assumed; he still didn't actually know their location) the only people around for miles, it was right, just as it was.

Nino was glad to be a part of it. Feeling glad made him quiet, made him pull back, just a bit, to observe and record his own impressions, but no one took offense. After a while, when the guitar had long been in its case, Aiba came back around to sit by him, and wordlessly they fit themselves together again.

It was late when they all retired to Super Soul, and whether drunk or sober, each of them had an arm around whoever was nearest. Nino stuck close to Aiba with a sort of contentment he didn't remember feeling before.

As Nino belatedly found out, Sho and Jun always brought a tent, preferring privacy to the stability of the RV, and they headed off into the woods with a wave and several shouts goodbye. Ohno and Gakky stumbled back to their tiny, doorless cabin, and Nino made sure Aiba made it up the ladder safely into their cramped bunk before following him up.

They lay together in close silence. Nino didn't let himself try to puzzle out who made the first move, but as they dropped off to sleep, they were holding hands.

===

The rain started when Nino had only been asleep for what felt like an hour or so. It might not have woken him up except that he'd been having uneasy dreams for a while, dreams about leaving, or losing, when the distant boom of thunder nudged him into consciousness.

He was lying awake, taking comfort in the steady drumming of rain on the roof so close to his head, when he heard noises outside.

For a while, he tried to ignore them, sure they were a remnant of his foreboding dream. At a particularly loud rustling, though, he felt around on the bunk until he found Aiba's arm and shook it, Ohno's bears plaguing his mind.

Aiba mumbled, "I know," and rolled over on top of Nino, still asleep.

Thoughts of the ominous noises disappeared in a wave of utter longing, though the practical part of his brain whispered that his lightheadedness was probably partly because Aiba's weight was giving him some trouble breathing.

Even so, that wasn't the only reason. There were endless reasons, all wrapped up in the person lying on top of him, from the spark in Aiba's eyes as he'd chased Nino around the forest to the feel of the baseball mitt from earlier, a real present for their fake anniversary, from the sucker-punch of desire of that one moment in the lake when Aiba had his arms around him from behind and their bodies aligned-- _fit_ \--to the way Aiba (Nino was almost sure it _had_ been Aiba) had reached out in the darkness and taken Nino's hand with no one watching and no reason to pretend.

There was also, quite simply, the guilty, glorious heat of Aiba's body on his--even if it was making it difficult to breathe in a less than romantic manner.

Slowly, ready to stop if Aiba so much as twitched, Nino raised his hands and rested them carefully on Aiba's waist.

Aiba made a tiny snuffling noise and turned his face. His mouth brushed Nino's jaw, banishing the last dregs of rationality from Nino's mind, and he shifted his hips, just slightly, in a way that had Nino stifling a whimper.

"Wake up, Aiba-chan."

Nino knew he was the one saying it, but he hated it anyway. He didn't want Aiba to stop--and he didn't want Aiba to do things sleeping that he wouldn't ever do awake.

It was so hard, so hard, but Nino stroked his hands up from Aiba's waist to his shoulders (broader than they used to be, and the perfect place for Nino's hands if only--) and pushed him away.

Halfway off Nino, with one leg still sprawled across Nino's hips, Aiba went stock-still.

Nino swallowed hard, trying to figure out what to say, and decided to go with something light. "My goodness, darling, not in front of our friends."

Aiba's tone was quiet, but there was nothing light about it. "Nino, would you let me tell you something?"

There was a knock on the door.

Nino, suddenly remembering about the bears (or the ax-murderer or the avalanche or any of many other terrible _wilderness_ things that could be coming for them in the meager protection of the motor home), clutched at Aiba's shoulders and said, far too late, " _There were noises._ "

Aiba startled away from him, and it was only then that Nino remembered that bears (and avalanches, and many of the other things on his list) wouldn't knock on the door. That did still leave ax-murderers, but--

But it was clearly Jun's voice saying, "I'm coming in," as the door opened. It was just like the flimsy shelter Super Soul provided not even to have been locked, Nino mused bitterly.

There was a bright light, then Jun stepped up and into view, phone held in front of him as a flashlight. Even in the dimness, Nino could see he was drenched.

"Are you all right, Matsujun?" Aiba asked, the barest hint of laughter in his voice. There _was_ something funny about the way Jun looked, though Nino needed to be able to see better to put his finger on it.

"I'm sorry, I have to turn on the lights," Jun said, letting the door slam behind him. The restrained temper in his voice had Nino wondering just what had happened to Sho, but then the door opened again.

"Ah, so cold!" Sho said, then flinched as the lights blinded him.

Nino, seizing his opportunity, had buried his face in Aiba's chest. Aiba wrapped an arm around his shoulders and made unnecessary soothing noises.

When Nino opened his eyes, Jun was converting the dinette to a bed with a single-minded intensity that was a little frightening. Nino realized that the funny thing about the way Jun looked was that even when he was soaking wet, Jun was still intensely and attractively Jun, like his strong facial features just couldn't help themselves.

"You promised me you fixed the tent," he said, his back to Sho.

"I did fix the tent," Sho said. He stripped off his soaked shirt and opened a cabinet door so he could hang it up. "I'll admit it's obvious I didn't fix the tent very _well._ "

Jun paused in unscrewing the support for the table and looked over his shoulder, clearly about to say something nasty. When he saw Sho, half-naked and wet and shivering, he cursed and stood up, then pushed past him and right out the door back into the rain.

Sho looked up at Aiba and Nino. "It's not that I can't see why he's upset."

"Did it leak?" Aiba asked, fascinated.

Nino, more to the point, asked, "Shouldn't you go after Jun-kun?"

"It collapsed, actually," Sho said, scratching his head sheepishly. "I think the weight of the water snapped the mended support and it came down on us... and we might have been, uh."

Aiba's laugh was so sudden it sounded like a hiccup.

"Occupied?" Nino offered, and Aiba laughed again.

Jun came back in with a bag in hand. This time, he closed the door quietly behind him, though it seemed impossible that Gakky and Ohno hadn't woken up by then.

"Sit." His voice was quiet, too, but it brooked no disobedience.

Sho slinked two feet to his right and perched on the bench next to the upturned table.

"Take everything off," Jun said next, kneeling and rummaging in the bag.

Crossing his arms over his chest protectively, Sho said, "But--"

"Hey remember that time in the bathhouse when we pretended our junk was in a beauty pageant?" Aiba said, laughing even more at Sho's misplaced prudery.

Sho snickered, then sighed. He pulled off his remaining clothes just in time for a towel to hit him in the middle of the chest.

Aiba whispered to Nino, "Mine won, but his got Miss Congeniality."

Nino stifled his laughter in Aiba's shirt, and the humor helped distract him from the continuing embrace Aiba didn't even seem to notice.

Sho'd gotten the towel around his waist and was sitting with his legs crossed at the knee, looking serene.

Jun, who'd stripped so quickly Nino half-suspected his clothes were held together by velcro, had his towel fastened securely as well, but he had another in his hands. It was a matter of two steps before he was in Sho's space and using the towel to carefully dry Sho's hair.

"I read a manga that had a scene like this in it once," Aiba said. "I think it was porn, but before I got to the good part I loaned it to Oh-chan and he lost it."

"Ah, sorry," Sho said, a little muffled by the towel. "He loaned it to me and I forgot to give it back."

"No porn for you in this one either," Jun said to Aiba. He ran a hand through his wet hair and flicked the water at Aiba's face.

Aiba yelped and squirmed but kept holding tightly to Nino's shoulders.

Nino, who'd been watching Jun and Sho with his chin resting on Aiba, felt his eyelids getting heavy. He decided it was time to go back to sleep while he still had an excuse to lie so close, so he promptly laid his cheek on Aiba's chest and sighed in a blatantly drowsy way. He was surprised into a shudder when Aiba's hand slipped up and stroked his hair.

"Goodnight, Nino," Aiba said softly.

Nino didn't trust himself to respond, so he didn't. Snuggled up under a blanket with the person he loved, with his own warmth and comfort even more apparent after seeing the amusing discomfort of others, he realized that he was swiftly falling back asleep for real.

The second to last thing he remembered was hearing Ohno's monotone voice say, "Matsujun should put looking good wet on his resume." The last thing was the feeling of Aiba's delighted laugh.

===

He woke up to Aiba's face.

It was not, as would have given him a shameful thrill, the face of a person lying beside him in their bed, but the face of a weirdo who was peering at him over the edge of the bunk.

"Aiba-chan?" Nino said stupidly, sleep still clogging his throat.

Aiba smiled. "You're awake," he cheered.

Nino blinked. It felt good, so he let the next one keep his eyes closed completely.

"No, no, no, it's time to gather firewood," Aiba said, shaking Nino roughly.

"Stop with any of your first three words and you've got my answer," Nino gritted out. He kept his eyes firmly shut.

What ensued next was an embarrassment of limbs, squawking, and terror that somehow ended with Nino safely out of the bunk and into Aiba's arms.

"I knew I'd get to princess-carry you," Aiba said smugly. He made for the door and promptly smacked Nino's head on the resurrected dinette table.

Nino flailed desperately, trying to shield himself or escape or both, and they ended up tangled together in the aisle of the motor home laughing and cursing and elbowing each other when they got breath enough to manage another attack.

A stern voice came from outside. "Aiba-san, I really need that firewood, please."

"Five more minutes, Mom," Nino whined, grinning when Aiba guffawed.

"Aiba-san."

Nino laughed at Jun's serious tone, but Aiba went still. He sounded apologetic when he said, "We should probably go."

Without Aiba's laughter, Nino came back to himself to realize he was entwined on the floor with someone who was only pretending to be his boyfriend, so he didn't argue as he extracted himself, got himself ready, and followed Aiba back into the dreaded wilderness.

Well, he did argue, but not as much as he wanted to.

Aiba groaned as he strode along forcefully. "Because Matsujun said we needed more firewood, and that's our job," he said for the fourth time, giving Nino a shove.

"But I shouldn't have to do chores because Gakky won the water-fight--"

"Results were inconclusive," Aiba said and stuck his nose in the air like the point was decided.

"Inconclusive between Gakky and Oh-chan, _maybe_ , but Jun-kun was the loser and you know it."

Aiba harrumphed and grabbed Nino's wrist to pull him through the forest even faster. "I concede that point, but the real reason we're out here is to practice!"

Nino went cold, then hot, then tripped over his own feet. The sting of his knees hitting the ground barely registered with the sudden, urgent anticipation he felt.

_And one really good kiss._

"Why didn't you catch me," he complained, trying not to look as flustered as he felt.

Aiba ignored that. He hauled Nino back to his feet and--oh god--took both of his hands.

"Imagine, we're in the clearing, and Matsujun and Sho-kun are watching, and I tell you I love you, that I really really love you, right?"

Nino made a little croaking noise that was apparently taken as assent. Aiba's handsome face was getting closer and closer.

"And I take your hands, and I step in close, and..." Aiba trailed off.

Nino could see each of Aiba's eyelashes, could hear Aiba's uneven breathing, could feel--

Could feel Aiba's mouth on his.

At last.

He tilted his head and closed his eyes and felt it all, and he wanted to remember it forever. It was Aiba, Aiba touching him, from the nervous grip of his hands to the soft parting of his lips against Nino's own. There was nothing but the taste of his mouth, the sound of his sigh, the way he pressed even closer like he didn't want to stop either.

Nino let his mouth open, just a little, just in case Aiba would want to practice more, just enough to hint without it being indefensible later, but Aiba didn't laugh or pull away.

Aiba didn't even hesitate. At the first touch of Aiba's tongue, Nino couldn't keep in a small, needy noise, and then Aiba was kissing him deeply. The idea of pretending, of holding back or explaining later, was as distant as everything but Aiba.

They kissed until Nino wasn't sure he'd ever be able to close himself off again.

Even when Aiba finally moved his mouth away, he didn't let go of Nino's hands. For a while, all either of them did was breathe.

Nino kept his eyes closed, feeling shattered, and far too late he tried to look--well, there wasn't any good way to look, but he tried to look a little less desperately in love.

"I bet breakfast is ready," Aiba said. Nino didn't have any time to process that before Aiba was pulling him back toward camp, muttering to himself, "Let's go, let's go."

Nino managed inconsequentially, "The firewood?" but Aiba just shook his head and kept going. Nino struggled to keep up when his whole body seemed intent on reliving the past five minutes in torturous detail.

They hit the edge of the clearing and kept going. Aiba was moving so fast and Nino was so dazed that it was a moment before he saw there was a huge banner hanging on the RV, that the whole group was gathered and looking at them, and there was no breakfast in sight.

Somehow the first thought Nino had about this was, _I might get another kiss soon, if this is what it looks like._

It seemed it was time to perform, time for their really good kiss to sway the course of Jun and Sho's relationship, and Nino was embarrassingly ready to say anything that would get Aiba's mouth back on his, even if it meant it was the last time.

They stopped in front of the group, who looked variously interested (Sho), concerned (Jun), sleepy (Gakky), and confused (Ohno). Aiba spun Nino to face him, took his hands, and said breathlessly, "Nino, I love you. I really really love you."

Nino did his best to blush adorably, wondering if he had any lines in this script before they got to the kissing. He heard a cheer, muffled a little too late, that might have been from Ohno.

Jun snapped his fingers, startling Nino out of his contemplation of Aiba's pretty eyes. "That's our cue," he said briskly.

Nino said, "Huh?"

A second later, he heard Ohno echo it. It gave him a small measure of satisfaction that at least one other person was as confused as he was.

Jun pulled a folding chair from behind him and set it up for Nino, who sat in it when Aiba gave him a gentle push. Gakky picked up a plastic bag from Super Soul's step and plopped it into Nino's lap. Sho took something big, flat, and white that had been leaning against the back of his legs and hung it from Super Soul's rolled-up awning.

Ohno said again, "Huh?"

After the bustle of activity was over, Jun, Gakky, and Sho lined back up with the slackjawed Ohno next to what Nino realized was a whiteboard. He looked at his incomprehensible best friend, wondering just what part he was supposed to be playing right then, and settled on looking affectionately expectant.

Aiba said grimly, "We are go go go go," and knelt down in the grass at Nino's feet. Nino's brain chose that moment to realize that when Aiba had hustled him out of bed and into the woods for firewood, he'd spared an extra minute for Nino to brush his teeth because he already knew they were going to be kissing.

"Nino. Um... so the purpose of this trip is three... four... many-fold. Number one, I wanted to help Matsujun and Sho-chan, though after hearing about them in the tent last night maybe they don't need our help."

"Tent?" Jun interrupted, tone flatly terrifying, but Aiba just flapped his hands at him and kept going.

"Number two, I wanted to get you out of the city, to take you into the woods, the mountains, to swim with you and play baseball, and I'm counting that one as a success also."

Nino snickered despite himself. "Also? So you're saying that in the tent because of us--" He broke off as he realized that if Aiba was discussing the plan so openly, it almost certainly meant his fake relationship was over. He crossed his arms over his chest and hugged himself tightly.

Aiba didn't seem to hear him at all, he was so intent on his plan. "Number three, I wanted you to have more friends so it'd be less likely you'd leave again. Number four, I needed to be utterly sure of my feelings before I could carry out number five, and number five, I wanted to get you somewhere where you couldn't run away."

"Like a serial killer would?" Nino wondered aloud. It was remarkable how calm he sounded when he felt like his head might pop off into the sky at any moment like an untied helium balloon. He noticed Sho was taking notes of Aiba's speech on the whiteboard, and that reminded him to look up to see what the stupid banner said.

It said, in English, _Moment of Truth_. At least Nino assumed it was supposed to, but Aiba seemed to have done the writing himself because the first word, no matter how he looked at it, was momo.

He stared, then shifted his gaze back to Aiba. "Though I'm the one who's feeling a bit violent. What do you mean, make it so I couldn't run away?"

"Wait, there's another list... I knew I should have brought my notes. I've been planning this for so long and I forget to bring my notes," Aiba said, running his hands in a frantic motion through his increasingly rumpled hair. "The other list was about asking my friends, our friends, to come along as observers."

Ohno repeated with more vigor, " _Huh_?" Jun and Gakky both turned to pat him on the shoulder consolingly.

"Sho-chan was the objective observer, since he'd never met you, and Gakky was in charge of supplies--"

"He said to pick out the cheapest things in the convenience store," Gakky said, pointing at the bag in Nino's lap.

"--and Matsujun, of course, knew you really well before, so he got the most important job. See, you've had so much practice that you're really, really good at lying to me, so I asked Matsujun... his job was to find out if you're in love with me."

Nino stood up abruptly. The bag from Gakky fell on the ground between him and Aiba. Then he sat back down with as much suddenness because he realized his legs weren't going to hold him.

"I think I missed something there. Jun-kun, could you repeat what your role is?" he asked, looking over at Jun. He couldn't muster a betrayed expression, couldn't even feel it, really, but he was sure after the shock wore off that he'd be mad.

Jun shrugged, face calm. "I agreed to try to find out because I already wanted to know, but I never said I'd tell him my conclusion."

Nino looked back down at Aiba, who looked put-upon. "And he wouldn't tell me! Some good as an observer, right?"

"If you're asking me for an opinion about something, I'd be happy to write you a list of my current objections," Nino said, tone controlled, words careful, heart in chaos. "And what is your role in all this, Aiba-chan?"

"Main," Aiba said at once, then tried, "Starring? You know, part of the main couple. Hero!"

Nino waited him out, mostly because he found he was incapable of speech. If Aiba suspected Nino's feelings for him, it was uncharacteristically cruel to ask him to pretend to be his boyfriend. If Aiba suspected his feelings... it really did make Nino want to run away.

Aiba pulled himself together to say, "My role was to confirm what I knew about myself already, plus to do all the things I thought might make you leave again, but do them here, where you couldn't. Start a new list, Sho-chan!"

Sho moved to a blank space on the whiteboard and waited expectantly.

"Come out as bisexual to you," Aiba said loudly. "Hold your hand all the time! Have Matsujun say you were in love with me in high school!"

Jun interjected urgently, "Which is a thought he had on his own, Nino, and not something I suggested--neither of us know if it's really true, right?"

Nino closed his eyes in humiliation as Aiba continued.

"Sleep in the same bed! Feed each other by hand!" He concluded triumphantly, "And one really good kiss!"

There was silence for a long stretch of seconds, silence broken only by Sho's rapid scribbling with the squeaky dry-erase marker. Nino looked over at the board, which had the list of Aiba's goals, of everyone's role in the prank, and now the list of what Aiba had thought would make Nino run away.

Aiba said carefully, "There's one more thing that I thought for sure would make you run."

Nino held up a hand to stop him. Something in his face must have warned Aiba not to push forward despite it.

This time when Nino stood, his legs didn't buckle. He took one step away from Aiba. When his legs still supported him and his heart didn't break, he kept going.

It was a relief when Aiba didn't follow.

===

Nino was back by the lake when Jun found him. It hadn't escaped his notice that he was sitting right in the place where he'd told Jun the truth the day before.

He met Jun's eyes mockingly, but Jun spoke before he could say anything.

"How's running away working out for you?"

Pushed beyond reason, Nino burst out, "Sometimes running away is the right choice, and whose place is it to decide, anyway, except for mine?"

After a beat, Jun sat in the chair next to him. He grimaced. "You might have told me this chair was soaking wet, Nino."

Nino squished from side to side in his own uncomfortable seat. "You know better than any of us how much it rained last night, _Matsujun._ "

Jun sighed. "He figured you'd need to run away. He didn't want to take that choice from you, so I'm here instead of him, okay? What he didn't want was for you to be alone."

"Why did you go along with all this?" Nino asked, but he didn't wait for Jun's answer. There was something that he needed to know more than anything else. "Why is he doing this?"

The problem was, he could think of one really good reason, but there were other possible reasons, too, and all of them were devastating. Even the good one (which couldn't be true, it _couldn't_ ) would turn his whole life upside-down, and the bad ones...

"Jun-kun, is he that worried about me leaving again that he's trying to force me to stay? How could he think outing my feelings would keep me--or does he think it's all a joke?" His worst fear, that Aiba knew his feelings and hated him for it, was something he couldn't say out loud even to Jun.

Jun reached over and took his hand. Nino didn't move away, but he didn't reciprocate either. "You know him better than I do, Nino, but you're not going to figure this out just by thinking about it on your own. You're going to have to go back and listen to him."

Nino muttered, "But he's being so fucking _ridiculous_ ," and Jun huffed a laugh that sounded like agreement. "I mean, really? What's with the banner? Why did he haul a whiteboard to the middle of nowhere?"

"You could ask him," Jun suggested hesitantly. He squeezed Nino's limp hand. "Go ask him, Nino."

Nino didn't move.

Jun let him sit in silence for a minute or two, but then he said seriously, "I can't make you go. But if you run away for real, if you're too scared to hear him out, you'll torture yourself over it, you know that, right? There's nowhere in the world you can move to that'll keep this from hurting. Go back and rip off the bandaid."

Nino made a grumpy noise. "Ripping off a bandaid is getting the pain over with quickly, so this doesn't fit. This could hurt forever; keep your metaphors to yourself."

Despite himself, he turned his hand over and laced his fingers through Jun's. It really did help, just a little bit, to have Jun there.

"How is that different from what you're feeling already? Just because I didn't tell Aiba-chan doesn't mean I can't see it," Jun said.

Closing his eyes, Nino whispered as if to himself, "Why are my friends so brutal..."

Jun laughed. "Be brutal yourself for once, huh? Make him deal with your feelings properly if he's going to bring them up at all."

"There's no coming back from that," Nino said, resignation in every syllable. "Things will never go back to how they were."

Jun made a noise like he wanted to say more, but he stopped himself.

After another minute of shameless cowardice, Nino stood up. He felt surprisingly steady for someone about to face a conversation he'd put off for nearly twenty years.

"Fine. Let's go back. But you have to pick up the pieces after."

"I'll be there," Jun promised, and they walked back up the path together.

===

Nino walked over and sat down in his chair as Jun took his place by the whiteboard again, though Sho was sitting on the motor home's step and Gakky was lying in the grass with her head in Ohno's lap. Ohno, somewhat comfortingly, still looked confused, if also a little drowsy.

Aiba was the only one who hadn't moved. He knelt where Nino had left him, looking disturbingly patient.

After fishing some melon bread out of the bag at his feet, Nino settled back with as calm an expression as he could muster. "I admit nothing," he said unencouragingly. "Explain yourself."

Aiba took a deep breath. It was somehow shocking to Nino to hear the catch in it, as if Aiba might be almost as nervous as he was.

"I was just figuring out I wasn't straight, you see, and then you left," he said. "It took me a while of you refusing to tell me exactly where you were--let me say for the millionth time that that's really weird, Nino, okay?--and only visiting once a year, and not drinking when you did, before I started to think that maybe..." He cut off for a second, studying Nino's expression.

Nino pretended to be made of impenetrable stone, which was extremely difficult with a mouth full of melon bread.

Aiba shifted uncomfortably in his position on the grass. "Well, once I thought you might have feelings for me, it seemed like the only thing that made sense. Especially since you would practically drag a stranger off the street to talk about rather than talk to me about kissing you--"

"I said I was sorry," Nino said, keeping his head up as best he could when he wanted to sink through his chair and into the ground. The food had been a mistake; it felt like swallowing chalk. "What else did you need to hear?"

Sho said, "Should I still be taking notes?" but Jun hissed immediately, "Only in your thick head, Sho-kun." Nino spared a glance at Jun's worried face and remembered that he should probably try to breathe.

"Nino..." Aiba said, face painfully earnest. "You idiot, I kissed you."

Nino snorted. "Who's the idiot? I got super drunk and kissed you, and I apologized; we don't have to make this production out of it."

Aiba didn't say anything. It was clear from his face that he wasn't taking back what he'd said, which was unfathomable...

But after a second, Nino unwillingly began to process it. He wouldn't believe it-- _couldn't_ believe it. The fact that he'd lost control and kissed Aiba was an underpinning of his life for the past five years. If that wasn't the truth, what could he trust to be as he thought?

Then suddenly, it made a nasty kind of sense. He said without thinking, "Ah, you were figuring out you were into guys? Don't worry, I forgive you for using me as your drunken experiment."

"I wasn't--Nino, you're not listening!" Aiba said. He sounded impatient for the first time.

"I never said I would," Nino said, and he took another bite of his melon bread just to be mean.

Ohno's soft voice came unexpectedly. "Don't give up, Aiba-chan."

Aiba, startled, turned to look at him with wide eyes. His hair was still sticking up in all directions, and Nino had an overwhelming urge to put it to rights, or maybe he just wanted to touch him. Now that their fake relationship was over, he might not get to touch Aiba like that again, especially with Aiba detonating this grenade in the middle of their friendship.

Looking a little embarrassed, Ohno gestured at Nino. "I'm an observer, right? Though I noticed you didn't give me a role..." he trailed off petulantly.

"Sorry, Oh-chan," Aiba said automatically.

Ohno nodded his regal acceptance before gesturing at Nino again. "Well, as an observer, I ob-obverse--"

"You can't even say it," Jun objected, and Sho chuckled.

Gakky poked at Ohno's forehead like she was encouraging him. Nino, with a break from everyone looking at him, took a shuddering breath.

Except Ohno was looking at him, and Ohno said, "He's terrified."

All eyes shifted to Nino, who sat frozen. It was kind of horrifying that he was going through this ordeal with a mouth that seemed it would never be free of melon bread sludge. He forced himself to swallow it and shoved the rest back in the bag so he wouldn't be tempted again.

Aiba took a deep breath and nodded. When he spoke, it was with more patience and entirely renewed enthusiasm.

"I have no intention of giving up. Nino, hasn't the past day together been good? Hasn't it been _really_ good?" he asked, dark eyes intent on Nino's face.

"Of course," Nino said coldly. "I am an excellent actor."

Aiba scooted a little closer, then moved the bag--which Nino realized now was the promised breakfast--out of the way and moved closer still. "And me?"

Nino could have reached out and touched Aiba's pink cheeks, his messy hair, his soft mouth--but he forced himself to look considering instead of tender. He got out, "I admit that it turns out you have hidden depths."

"I don't," Aiba said simply. "I don't have hidden depths, Nino, I'm just in love with you."

Nino felt like he might throw up. It wasn't that he hadn't seen it coming, at least as something that might possibly, maybe, potentially be what was going on, but it was hard to balance nearly two decades of unrequited love against a new and uncertain hope.

"Say that again."

Aiba moved even closer, eyes beseeching. He also looked suddenly happy, like getting his feelings out into the open was a joyful thing. Nino couldn't relate, but he was trying his best to listen.

"Nino, I'm in love with you. I'm sorry it took me so long."

Nino just stared for a moment longer, then snapped, "Everybody out."

"We're already outside..." Sho whispered, and Gakky stifled a nervous chuckle.

"The lake," Ohno said with rare decisiveness. "Grab the fishing gear!"

Jun said, unimpressed, "Grab it yourself." He gave Nino a guts pose before helping Sho up and walking with him out of the clearing.

"Aiba-chan," Nino said as Ohno and Gakky left, he with the fishing gear, she with the umbrella. Despite the tension of the moment, he was unable to help sharing what he'd seen with his best friend. "Jun-kun and Sho-san were just holding hands."

Aiba, who'd been staring at Nino like the world could end and he still wouldn't move, snapped his head around as if the pair might still be in sight. "No way! Holding hands, them?! I can't believe I missed it..."

Before he looked back around, Nino said as fast as he could, "I love you, Aiba-chan."

He thought Aiba might launch himself forward, and the tiniest part of him, the one that still suspected this might all be a prank, thought Aiba might laugh, but instead Aiba just met his eyes and went very, very still.

Then he grinned. "Say it again."

"I love you--" Nino got out, and then he was in Aiba's arms. He pressed his face against Aiba's neck and tried not to babble his whole heart out. It was a close call.

Then the first rush of happiness faded, and that's when another one of Nino's ugly fears, the very newest one he had, became pressing. He sighed, and for a second he hated his feelings so much he wanted to break something. "You don't need to let go, but I have to ask..."

"Anything," Aiba said fervently. He pulled Nino out of the chair so he could embrace him properly, and somehow Nino ended up back in Aiba's lap. It felt just as right as the last time, which didn't make Nino's next words any easier.

"You made this whole plan, but did you ever figure out what to do if the person you love--"

"That's you," Aiba interrupted, obviously about a second away from laughing or singing or some other expression of euphoria.

Nino hugged him tighter and said softly, "What if it's been too long? What if I'm too used to loving you on my own, and I don't know if I'm able to try it together?"

Aiba tensed, but he didn't let go. He sat there, Nino in his lap, arms twined around Nino's waist, for what felt like forever. Then he said, "It's true that I didn't make a plan for that."

Nino wasn't sure how he could feel so warm, so safe, and so loved, and simultaneously feel like he was about to have a heart attack from terror. He'd spent years imagining out romantic relationships with Aiba, but to actually have one now seemed like an act of bravery he'd never be able to muster. He could just imagine what Jun would say, but it didn't change the sick anxiety trying to take him over.

Aiba's voice was chiding as he said, "But don't forget that I am master at planning, as I have proved--"

"By dragging me out into the wilderness, making your friends spy on me, and forgetting your notes? And please, if you want to explain what a momo of truth is, I am ready to hear that at any time," Nino laughed, completely in love with this person he could laugh with even as he worried he was going to ruin the best thing that had ever happened to him.

Aiba, using upper body strength that gave Nino an unexpected thrill, set Nino back into his chair. He took Nino's hands and looked into his eyes. "I'm going to ignore your lack of faith."

Nino made himself meet Aiba's gaze as long as he could, then looked away.

Aiba said, "Let's keep pretending."

"What?" Nino asked, his eyes drawn right back to Aiba's. He couldn't have heard correctly.

Aiba leaned in so close that Nino's eyes practically crossed. "We don't have to get together for real, right? If that's so scary, we can just keep pretending! It's obvious we're really good at it."

"Who said I was scared," Nino said, hunching into himself. But Aiba still had hold of his hands, and Aiba was looking at him with conspiratorial certainty that his plan would work, and Aiba said he _loved him..._ and Nino realized in the next moment that despite the idiocy of the plan, something about it was easing his terror. The idea of continuing to pretend with Aiba, or to pretend they were pretending, made a fizzy feeling appear in Nino's heart, like his love had found an escape hatch and there was safety after all.

He imagined a future stretching out in front of him with Aiba, and when his throat started to close up in instinctive panic, he told himself that they were just pretending. Any time it was too scary, he could pretend a little harder, and maybe, someday, when he grew as brave as Aiba, he wouldn't have to pretend at all.

"What about when there aren't other people around?" he asked, but he already knew what Aiba would say.

Aiba smiled, that confident, slightly wicked smile that made his dimples crease just so. "There's always practice, right?"

Nino didn't let himself think for a single second more, because logic had no place in a world where Aiba was looking at him like that. Aiba who loved him.

He swallowed hard, hoped desperately for neither of their hearts to be broken, and said, "Then let's get started already."

Aiba lit up, ecstatic thoughts of love and kissing apparent all over his face. Then he looked confused. Nino found with frustration that he still wasn't being kissed.

"I'm sorry," Aiba said, embarrassed. "I think my legs are asleep, because I have to say that standing up is a little impossible right now."

"You have got to be kidding me," Nino complained, pulling his hands away. "After all your planning, and you can't even stand up!"

When he saw Aiba looked crestfallen, though, he finished quickly, "But since it's my fault for keeping you down there so long without understanding what you were saying so ineptly... I'll come to you."

He took Aiba's red face gently in his hands, leaned down with a smile, and kissed him.

Though Aiba's legs might not have been working, his kisses were still better than any one-sided imagining Nino had ever had.

= = = = = =

One excellent thing about pretending to be in a relationship instead of starting one for real was that they didn't have to use many words to define what was going on. They had their pretend relationship and they were in it together, and other than that it'd be invented on the fly.

That left even more room for kissing, which wasn't something Nino planned to complain about. After what felt like an hour but was perhaps five minutes in reality, Aiba broke away to speak in a voice even huskier than usual.

"Let's push pause for a minute, okay?"

"I'd say that's the worst idea you've had today, but you've really been outdoing yourself," Nino said, clinging to Aiba's shoulders and peppering kisses--practice kisses--on his chin, his mouth, his pretty cheekbones. He pulled back to grin right into Aiba's face. "And it isn't even noon!"

"First off, it's early afternoon," Aiba laughed. "Second, there's one more part to my plan!"

Nino groaned and flopped backwards in despair, secure in the knowledge that Aiba wasn't going to let go of him any time soon.

Aiba reached into the discarded plastic bag and brought out something Nino hadn't noticed at all. It looked like a little horn--

It _was_ a little horn, what the hell, and Aiba was blowing on it for all he was worth.

In the ensuing silence, Nino mused, "I may never hear again. I hope your plan is worth it."

"I bet it'll take a while," Aiba said, gaze dropping to Nino's mouth. "Don't you think we need a little more practice?"

It was tempting to pretend not to hear him, but Nino wasn't made of steel.

They were still kissing when the other four members of their party entered the clearing at a nervous trot. Nino covered his face with both hands, trying to will down his blush, among other things. From the shifting under him he realized he was about to be lifted back into the chair, and it was all he could do to grab the bag of snacks as he went so he could hold them in his lap for whatever ordeal was coming next.

Nervously, he looked at the rest of the group, all of whom he considered friends, though most were of extremely new standing, and all of whom were here because they wanted Aiba to be happy. Was it awful of him that he was going to be fooling them again, even in a gray area sort of thing like pretending--or pretending to pretend--to be with Aiba?

Then he looked back down at Aiba and saw the flush on his cheeks, the glow in his eyes, and the rumpled glory of his well-mussed hair. Aiba looked happy--not just happy, but the kind of happy that expected to get better with time, and with _lots_ of time to do it.

In this case, Nino figured, eyes transfixed by this person who meant more to him than any other, the ends justified the means. He settled back into his chair with a semblance of calm, though he was horrified to realize his hands were itching to haul out the melon bread again.

Aiba looked solemnly at his chosen observers. "It is time," he said, voice sonorous, "to invoke one of our planned post-scripts. I am delighted to announce that I am invoking Code Happy Ending."

Sho cheered, Jun looked smug, Gakky grinned, and Ohno said, "Huh?"

As the four of them huddled up so the code could be explained to Ohno, who apparently had to participate in this part, Aiba leaned up to whisper in Nino's ear, "Pretend happy ending, you know."

Nino laughed and barely kept himself from kissing Aiba again right in front of everyone.

When the observers were back in their line by the whiteboard, Aiba gestured with great condescension at Sho. "Our key words, if you would, Sho-kun."

Sho bowed deeply, smirking, and moved in front of the whiteboard. He wrote something down, and when he was done, he went back and added quote marks with glaring, vehement deliberation.

"Ahhh," Nino said, understanding even before he saw the words. "This is something Aiba-sensei is forcing you to write, hm?"

Sho nodded and moved out of the way so everyone could see the board and its boldly-written message.

**"** _The mend justifies the mean._ **"**

Nino snickered, then clapped his hands over his mouth to hold it in.

Gakky asked with careful innocence, "Could you explain just what you mean by that, Aiba-chan?"

Aiba, ignoring the currents of mockery in the air, gestured expansively as he said, "Well, the plan worked, but it was kinda mean, right? But now, as long as we mend it--" Here he gestured at Nino, apparently implying that something in Nino was what they needed to fix. "--it'll be justified!" He seemed to sense that his plan was about to devolve into outright insubordination because he pointed at Sho and snapped, "You first."

Nino watched as Aiba vacated the position in front of his chair, which was starting to feel more like a throne, or a judge's bench, and Sho took his place.

Sho, though his eyes were smiling, said sincerely enough, "Nino, I'm sorry that even though I just met you, I partook in a plan to deceive you, one that I knew would be, from what Aiba-san explained, hurtful to you at times. I hope you will find it in yourself to forgive me."

He bowed, and Gakky moved forward hastily to take his place. Nino sneaked a glance over to see that Ohno looked dismayed, no doubt because he was going to have to say something when he hadn't even known what was going on.

Gakky gave a little bow to start. "Nino, I'm sorry that I was kind of halfway in on some weird plan... that I could tell, um, was probably huge and life-changing to you, and I hope you'll forgive that I still went through with it even though I didn't know what was going on." She smiled at him. "I would also like to thank you for betting on me in the water-fight, and I'm glad to tell you that Oh-chan and I played rock-paper-scissors a minute ago to decide who actually won, and it was me."

Nino grinned at her and gave her a dashing thumbs-up in recognition of this feat.

As Gakky moved away from the spot of mending, Ohno started to shuffle forward, but Jun put a hand on his chest and pushed him back so he could take the next spot himself.

He stood in front of Nino for a minute, clearly thinking, and then he offered Nino his hand. Nino took it without hesitation only to be hauled up in a fierce hug.

After a moment of surprise, he melted comfortably into it, letting Jun show his feelings in actions rather than words.

Then, softly enough that only Nino could hear, Jun whispered in his ear, "I'm not sorry."

Nino laughed out loud, and Jun hugged him even tighter.

Then, inevitably, it was Ohno's turn. As Jun stepped awkwardly back to his spot by Sho, Nino said, "Come on over here, old man."

Ohno smiled and stepped forward, and that was when Aiba scooted ahead of him and back into the spot in front of Nino. When Ohno made a helpless sound of protest, Jun simply clapped a hand over Ohno's mouth and kept his eyes on Nino and Aiba.

"Nino, I'm sorry," Aiba started, eyes warm with affection. "I know we're going to have to talk about all this more, and I know I'll have more things to apologize for when we do. I hope you realize how much I love you, and how much our plan..."

_Our pretending plan..._

"... is something I can't wait to do with you every day until you tell me otherwise."

In a rush of bravery, Nino said, "It might be soon," and Aiba's face went quietly incandescent with happiness. He obviously heard what Nino was actually saying: that maybe, just maybe, he'd be able to be with Aiba without any pretending sooner rather than later.

By the whiteboard, Sho said slowly, "Doesn't that mean he might break up with him soon...?"

"It's important to be realistic," Nino said kindly, throwing him a supercilious look. Then he turned back to Aiba and said seriously, "Of course, it might not be soon at all."

Aiba only smiled. "I can wait."

After a moment, he realized he was seeming to say that he'd wait for Nino to break up with him, because he said hastily, "Um, or not wait? Whichever. As long as I'm with you, Nino, and we're trying our best together."

Nino was thinking of kissing once more when Jun said brusquely, "Well then, finish us off, Captain."

Obviously trying not to laugh, Aiba moved out of the way, and Ohno stepped reluctantly forward. He stood in front of Nino for a second, face a mess of confusion and indecision.

Nino offered him his hands, inwardly gleeful when Ohno automatically took them. He urged, "Just speak from your heart, Oh-chan."

Ohno's face went blank. Then he stepped back, bowed as deeply as he possibly could, and yelled, "I'm very sorry for my part in this unforgivable plan!"

Jun stepped forward and smacked him on the head, laughing, and Aiba pointed accusingly at Ohno.

"Ahh, now you've spoiled it, Captain!"

Sho was laughing so hard he looked like he might cry, and Gakky said, "I can't believe I am dating such a terrible man."

Ohno rubbed his head, laughing helplessly, then gestured around at all of them and barked, "You're all the worst! I'm going fishing!" He turned on his heel and walked snappishly away.

Gakky followed him, laughing to herself, and Sho and Jun went after her. Though Nino watched closely, he couldn't see their hands touch at all.

They had to be doing it on purpose.

Just then, he thought of a question he should've asked earlier. "Hey, Aiba-chan?"

Aiba turned inquisitively from where he was erasing the whiteboard. "Nino-chan?"

"Where are we?"

Aiba smiled broadly and walked over to him. "With each other, right?"

Nino buried his face in his hands. "You really are the most ridiculous person."

Aiba just waited him out, and when Nino let his shield drop so he could get a look at that expressive face, Aiba grabbed his hand and towed him off down the path after the others.

"Tell me there's not another part to your plan," Nino complained, holding on tight with an emotion a lot like elation.

"There isn't," Aiba conceded. "I was just thinking that Oh-chan and Gakky are probably headed back out to the float to smooch behind the umbrella."

"So soon in our fake relationship and you're already talking about another couple making out," Nino sighed, only to be stopped short and given an enthusiastic kiss on the cheek.

"No, no, that's not it," Aiba said slyly. "What I'm saying is: why don't we get there _first._ "

Nino stared at him, wide-eyed, heart pounding from Aiba's sudden display of affection. Then he comprehended the evil of Aiba's new plan and his face broke into a grin. "Do you think we can make it?"

Aiba shrugged and started walking again, a little quicker this time. "They don't know they have any competition, now do they?"

Nino laughed and started running. As Nino had known he would, Aiba sprinted along beside him, but what was new and surprising--what was pretty much the thing Nino was most grateful for in life right then--was that he was still holding onto Nino's hand like he'd never let go.

They passed Sho and Jun, and such was the urgency of their mission that they didn't even stop to goggle at the sight of Sho with his arm around Jun's waist, though Aiba gave a cheerful whoop as they flew by.

Nino heard Jun say thoughtfully behind them, "Hey, you don't think they're going to try for the float?"

A few seconds later there was the slapping sound of running footsteps behind them. Nino didn't know if Jun and Sho were coming to watch the battle or join in, but either way it only made him and Aiba run faster.

They caught up to Ohno and Gakky at the rocky beach, just a little past the two damp lawn chairs, and in unspoken agreement they stopped on a dime and tried to look innocent.

Gakky frowned, halfway out of her shirt, and Ohno said, "What'd we forget?"

This time, Nino toed out of his shoes, glad he hadn't had time to put on socks when Aiba forced him out into the woods that morning.

Ohno caught sight of this movement, his eyes tracking Nino suspiciously, but then Aiba bellowed, "Super Soul, we are go go go go!"

Nino charged into the water with Aiba by his side, their eyes fixed with determination on the distant umbrella.


End file.
